It was a trend few people could ignore. Questionable massage parlors with blacked out windows were popping up throughout unincorporated northern Harris County in 2009. However, the county and law enforcement had few tools at their disposal to address the issue at the time.
That year, Harris County Precinct 4 Constable Ron Hickman created the regulatory enforcement unit, which began investigating questionable businesses, including those suspected of being sexually oriented businesses. Two years later, a bill authored by State Rep. Patricia Harless, R-Spring, gave Harris County commissioners the ability to strengthen regulations of sexually oriented businesses.
"Constable Ron Hickman's office has done a great job of cutting down on the number of illegal, illicit massage parlors on [FM] 1960," Harless said. "Before, [law enforcement] couldn't go in there because they didn't have the budget to have the sex crime unit. Our bill gave county commissioners the ability to allow the local law enforcement to do something about it."
With more weapons at their disposal to address the problem, law enforcement is seeing fewer sexually oriented businesses in unincorporated Harris County. However, the problem remains, and both law enforcement and local nonprofits are working together to help victims and educate the public on the issue.
Sex trafficking
The National Human Trafficking Resource Center estimates that human trafficking generates billions of dollars every year in the U.S., and there are as many as 1.5 million human trafficking victims in North America alone.
Tim Cannon, assistant chief deputy for the Harris County Precinct 4 constable's office, said sex traffickers often operate a sexually oriented business under the guise of a business offering massage or spa services.
Cannon and human trafficking investigator Tonya Ward said sex trafficking victims who are utilized as prostitutes at these businesses come from all over the world, whether it is across the border from Mexico, from airports in New York and California and even from within the U.S.
"The traffickers have to get involved in an emotional type of connection where [victims feel] that threat of force or coercion," Cannon said. "There's some type of financial dependency that comes from that or maybe something they would rely on, such as food or housing or other needs."
Although Ward said the majority of the victims she has encountered enter the sex trade between the ages of 12 and 15, some girls are introduced to the trade as early as the fourth grade.
"It's changed because of the Internet," Ward said. "They're having that relationship [with sex traffickers] before they even leave the house now."
Getting into the sex trade can be easy for the victims, but getting out can be difficult, Ward said. Although victims are often picked up by law enforcement or speak with nongovernmental organizations, they often go right back to the trade because of the dependency victims develop on their traffickers.
"It's a form of modern-day slavery," Cannon said. "Typically, these are persons who feel they are working what they feel is maybe earning a living or a way to make money. But then they're having to give the majority of that money to a pimp or a person who's housing them or holding them."
Enforcing the law
Since Hickman created the REU in 2009, the unit has conducted 448 inspections of massage parlors, game rooms and other suspicious businesses in and around Precinct 4, resulting in 720 charges being filed.
Cannon said law enforcement generally targets the prostitution side of trafficking because it attacks the supply and demand of the traffickers. He said the constable's office uses undercover operations and often just walk up and knock on the door to investigate a suspicious business. Finding those in charge of the trafficking rings can be difficult, however.
"Before, [law enforcement] couldn't go in there because they didn't have the budget to have the sex crime unit. Our bill gave county commissioners the ability to allow the local law enforcement to do something about it."
- Rep. Patricia Harless, R-Spring
"Our goal is to find those who are running the ring, but in doing that, we have to start at that base level," he said. "We have to find a way to interview these people, and that's what our investigators do."
Ward said the changes in county regulations in 2011 have allowed the constable's office to attack human trafficking on another level, in addition to the state occupations code and the state attorney's office.
"On top of that, we also work with federal authorities that have their own human trafficking enforcement powers under Title 18," Ward said.
Chapter 77 of Title 18 in the U.S. Code contains several provisions that target human trafficking, according to the Department of Justice.
The Harris County Precinct 4 constable's office works closely with other law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, the Department of Public Safety and the Houston Police Department. Cannon said Ward and the REU also work with the constable office's high-tech crimes unit.
"The Internet is wonderful, but it's also proved to be a huge obstacle and a hurdle we have to contend with," Ward said.
Cannon said about 80 percent of registered sex offenders have been convicted of child exploitation. In targeting child predators, he said it also helps attack sex trafficking on a different front.
"Not only do you hit it on the street like we're doing with the human trafficking, [but] you also have to go out on the websites to see what's going on there," he said. "That's a whole other side of that, and out of that child pornography group comes more exploitation and trafficking."
Helping the victims
In the last 10 months, Ward said the constable's office has rescued eight victims. Cannon and Ward said they work with several different agencies to help the victims once they have been rescued, including nongovernmental organizations, such as Redeemed Ministries and Home of Hope.
Founded in 2005, Redeemed Ministries focuses on providing trauma-informed aftercare for domestic adult women who have been victims of sex trafficking, Executive Director Dennis Mark said. The organization also emphasizes advocacy and engages the community as well as the Texas Legislature on trafficking issues.
Operating in north Houston, Redeemed Ministries purchased land for a safe house in Brazos County four years ago. The facility offers a one-year program that provides a variety of therapeutic methods for the victims to heal as well as educational and social services.
"The idea is to heal them from the trauma, but also prepare them for living life and being able to make decisions on their own," Mark said.
In addition to the 12-bed facility the nonprofit is trying to construct, Mark said the organization is also building a 30-day assessment center in North Houston, which could be completed in March.
"This would be a place for law enforcement to bring women to us [who] could potentially be victims of trafficking, and let us access their needs and help them decide what the next step is," Mark said.
Funding for the organization comes from private individuals, organizations, churches and private grants, Mark said. The organization receives no funding from the federal government or the state.
Home of Hope, a Spring-based nonprofit which treats girls between the ages of 8 and 18, also receives no state or federal funding. Home of Hope President Rodney Daniels said the lack of government funding hurts nonprofits efforts to help treat sex trafficking victims. Nationwide, he said there are less than 300 beds for victims who are minors.
Home of Hope helps law enforcement find treatment facilities for victims after they have been rescued, Daniels said. In addition, Daniels said Home of Hope has been working in the last few months to acquire and make improvements to a facility of its own for sex trafficking victims who are minors.
"We get calls from different organizations [and law enforcement] that are doing the same thing, asking if we have beds available," he said. "So, it's a big need, but it's not just the monetary [need]. You have to be licensed in the state, you have to have psychological availability, you have to have medical [care and] teaching."
Mark said there are only about 37 trauma care centers nationwide that are capable of properly caring for sex trafficking victims.
"If we were to rescue every victim tomorrow, we wouldn't be able to help them," he said. "And that's not fair to the women. We're asking them to help themselves by crying out for help, but we don't have the resources to solve this problem for them."
Predicting the future
Although law enforcement may have made a dent in sex trafficking in the Spring area, officials say the problem is far from solved. Cannon said he believes traffickers will continue to move farther away from the city of Houston to other counties.
"It's sort of like stomping an ant bed: [if] you stomp that ant bed enough, eventually those ants are going to get up and move," he said. "If they start moving out to Montgomery County or Fort Bend County, we're on top of those guys saying 'Look, it's coming. You better be prepared for [the problem] and here's what we've done to be successful at [combating] it."
Meanwhile, despite improvements made on the prosecution and prevention side of the issue from previous legislative sessions, Mark said there are other pieces of legislation that could be passed to better protect trafficking victims once they are rescued from the sex trade.
He said he would like to see legislation that would seal or expunge the criminal records of sex trafficking victims.
"We're looking at ways to better improve the situation of these women when they get out, because if they feel trapped and there's no other options for them, they won't seek rescue," Mark said. "If we can [give them] incentives, maybe we can see more women identify themselves more regularly."
