Plymouth County Keeps Puritanism Alive With Bogus Sex Trafficking Stings

Five men face "trafficking a person for sexual servitude" charges after meeting an undercover cop at a hotel.

Puritanism is still alive in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, only now it poses as saving people from human trafficking. Earlier this month, five men were charged with "trafficking a person for sexual servitude" after showing up for a sexual tryst at a Plymouth County hotel.

The sting operation was conducted by Massachusetts State Police, the Boston Police Human Trafficking Task Force, and local cops from Plymouth County and the city of Rockland, according to a statement from Plymouth County District Attorney Tim Cruz. Authorities posted ads online pretending to be an adult sex worker.

Five men, ages 26 to 49, took the bait, responding to the ad and showing up at the arranged meeting point. They were expecting to meet an adult woman who wanted to have sex with them, albeit for a fee. Instead, they were arrested and face charges for sex trafficking.

If convicted, they'll be sentenced to a mandatory minimum of five years in prison without the possibility of parole, plus mandatory registration on the Massachusetts Sex Offender Registry. The possible punishment for trafficking an adult for sexual servitude includes up to 20 years in prison and a $25,000 fine.

All five men pleaded not guilty and are due back in court in September.

Per the district attorney's statement—titled "Five Men Charged With Human Trafficking"—the stings were part of "a mission to reduce the demand of commercial sexual exploitation occurring in Plymouth County." Parroting the D.A., the Boston Globe published the arrested men's names and uncritically reported their arrests as the result of a "sex trafficking sting."

Stopping men from paying sex workers for consensual hookups is apparently what Massachusetts law enforcement (and the state's biggest newspaper) thinks that fighting "sexual exploitation" looks like.

Alas, it's an all-too-common misconception (or at times willful misrepresentation) across the U.S. these days, where consensual sex somehow becomes "sexual servitude," "sex trafficking," "human trafficking," and "modern slavery" as soon as money is involved.

Adult women who willingly offer sexual services for money are rendered children, unable to legally consent, while those who would pay them are rendered as horrible predators, deserving of media coverage and sometimes legal penalties equal to those applied to people who rape, abuse, and enslave. The absence of any "victims" doesn't make a difference.

It's yet another reminder of just how divorced from reality (and popular conceptions of exploitation and abuse) U.S. "sex trafficking" and "human trafficking" operations have become.

Comments

[mad.casual]

Puritanism is still alive in Plymouth County, Massachusettes

Actual no-shit Puritans?

The sting operation was conducted by Massachusetts State Police, the Boston Police Human Trafficking Task Force, and local cops from Plymouth County and the city of Rockland, according to a statement from Plymouth County District Attorney Tim Cruz.

Oh, NeoPuritans and, exceedingly more likely, some no-shit nth-wave "Women aren't sex objects to be purchased!" feminists in the mix.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

The Women's Temperance League is on the case.

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[D-Pizzle]

How the hell did they get to "trafficking a person for sexual servitude" from this incident?

[Longtobefree]

Maybe all the guys drove to the appointed place?

[sarcasmic]

How does keeping your own grain constitute interstate commerce?

[Dillinger]

Filburn got jobbed.

[D-Pizzle]

I looked up the relevant statute. It turns out that basically all prostitution in Mass is covered by this statute. Also, per the statute, most prostitutes are guilty of this, moreso than the "Johns," since it's usually the prostitutes initiating the commercial interaction. Finally, in this case, the cops are the more guilty parties.

[Rossami]

Demand management. Because these people wanted consensual sex for money, they marginally increased the market for sex for money and maybe, perhaps, if you squint just right, fractionally increased the economic incentive for someone else to provide non-consensual sex for money.

It's an absurd stretch. Unfortunately, it's a legally defensible stretch since the Supreme Court said that buying a pair of scissors at WalMart is enough to subject your entire business to "interstate commerce".

[Bill Godshall]

Prostitution bans should have been repealed decades ago, but left wing feminists and right wing puritans coalesced to not only preserve prostitution bans, but to double down by falsely labelling activities conducted by consenting adults as "child sex trafficking".

[Bill Godshall]

Same thing happened with pornography, as porno prohibitionists now routinely refer to adult porn as "child porn".

[ipsquire]

Let's starting referring to all police activity as "brutality" the way they refer to all sex work as "trafficking". "Officers brutalized 5 suspects in a trafficking sting operation" sounds fair.

[Granite]

Acab

[Overt]

It actually is a trinity of authoritarianism. Because the Police (from the federal government down to the local level) are also working on this. They are losing all that sweet, sweet drug war money, and so they are now finding the crisis of INTERNATIONAL SEX TRAFFICKING in their towns.

[NOYB2]

They are losing all that sweet, sweet drug war money

That's absurd. Only marijuana is being decriminalized, and growing and distribution without a state license and taxes is still illegal. Not only are states getting the tax dollars, they are also getting money from prosecuting tax evasion and black market operations.

[Jefferson's Ghost]

"It's yet another reminder of just how divorced from reality (and popular conceptions of exploitation and abuse) U.S. "sex trafficking" and "human trafficking" operations have become."

Yet the government forces the young kids of parents (usually poor parents), sometimes under threats of arrest (thank you, Kamala Harris), to spend most of their days slaving away in what some folks call schools (others refer to them as indoctrination camps). But this isn't "human trafficking."

[n00bdragon]

It's never a crime when the government does it.

[TJJ2000]

^THIS; And the police have been charged for soliciting the public for sexual servitude???? Is that not EXACTLY what they did????

That day people start to realize 'law enforcement' is breaking laws just so they can arrest others. They've been playing the entrapment games for quite a while now but should be arrested for their illegal actions. It's not right to play 'war games' with citizens.

[Dillinger]

so I don't get free Yankees tix?

[Old Smokin' Egg]

I've just been busted for prostitution. If I allow the cops to believe that I entered willingly into the transaction, I'm looking at a fine and jail time. However, if I tell them that I'm a victim of trafficking, I walk free, probably with a fistful of free-food coupons and rent vouchers courtesy of help-trafficking-victims organizations.

Is it any wonder that politicians and do-gooders are able to find so much evidence for an epidemic of human trafficking, even if the phenomenon is actually quite rare?

[Rossami]

But the police and politicians can't find that evidence, even with the economic incentives you describe for the sex worker. Contrary to your hypothetical, sex workers in the US and Europe are pretty open about saying that they are doing it consensually. They don't claim to be "trafficked" because they know that they'd never be able to continue turning tricks if they made such an accusation.

More egregious, even your scenario doesn't apply to the situation above. The police are claiming "trafficking" where the alleged sex worker was a cop running a sting.

[Overt]

I mean, while I wouldn't doubt that happens from time to time, as near as I can tell, the individual prostitutes are still the ones constantly being busted for these crimes. They aren't walking away with food vouchers, they are being sent to jail while some DA or police captain has a press conference claiming to have broken up a Sex Trafficking Ring.

[Bill Godshall]

Facebook has removed 18 million posts about covid (that disagreed with Zucherberg's unscientific left wing opinions).
https://www.newsmax.com/us/facebook-zuckerberg-covid-misinformation/2021/08/18/id/1032864/

But Facebook still hasn't removed any of the false claims about covid made by WHO, Fauci, CDC, NIH, or state/local health officials (who repeated CDC's lies to prevent losing their CDC federal block grant $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$), nor any of the false claims about covid told by Biden, Harris, Cuomo, Newsome, Wolf, Murray or other Democrats or their left wing media allies).

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Facebook has removed 18 million posts containing COVID-19 misinformation, founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said.

Zuckerberg, however, would not say how many times those posts were viewed or shared.

That's a hell of an interesting way to present a story.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Anti-vaccine passport protest in Montreal this week drew an estimated 100,000 people. Just throwin' this out here, you know... for discussion.

These Delicious Cookie Recipes Might Just Outshine the Pie This Thanksgiving
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Thousands gathered Saturday in the streets of Montreal to protest against the province of Quebec's Covid-19 vaccine passport, which will go into effect early next month.

a close up of a bottle: Quebecers wanting to participate in a number of activities such as eating at a restaurant will need to present proof of vaccination beginning September 1© AHMAD GHARABLI Quebecers wanting to participate in a number of activities such as eating at a restaurant will need to present proof of vaccination beginning September 1
Holding signs that said "Freedom!" and "We are not laboratory rats," the demonstrators, many of whom came with their families, paraded peacefully under a blazing sun in downtown Montreal.

Quebecers wanting to eat at a restaurant, go to a bar, exercise at the gym or attend a festival will need to present proof of vaccination against the coronavirus beginning September 1, under a measure introduced by the province earlier this week.

"It should be the choice of each person whether to be vaccinated. With the passports it is a means of forcing us" to get vaccinated, said Veronique Whalen, a 31-year-old who came with her family and said she doesn't normally attend protests.

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"I'm here for my children, I'm afraid for them. It's discrimination," she said.

Other signs in the crowd read "Dictatorship," "The vaccine scam," and "Health apartheid," and were seen dotting the crowd alongside a number of Quebec flags.

Several women held posters reading "My body, my choice," using the popular feminist slogan that is also associated with the abortion rights movement.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Apologies for the cut-n-paste fail. But it's in there.

[mad.casual]

I thought it was pretty good satire.

Reality: 100,000 people protesting vaccine passports.
Reason: The 10 Most Libertarian Cookie Recipes!

[Heresolong]

"Chanting "Freedom" and other anti-goverment slogans"

There. Fixed it for you.

[Moridin]

ENB, I am offended by your use of the term "puritanism" as a pejorative. There are many great Puritan writings that are still published today. You would do well to learn from them. You should start by trying something by John Owen. Though I think the sentences would be too long for you to follow. But, until you can refute every single one, with sound reasoning and argumentation (which is something readers of this site know you are not capable of), you have no right to appropriate that terminology. Those long dead, old, white men of yesteryear await your apology....

[NOYB2]

You'll just have to deal with it.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

"...where consensual sex somehow becomes "sexual servitude," "sex trafficking," "human trafficking," and "modern slavery" as soon as money is involved."

And that "somehow" is the outcome of an unholy alliance between politicians, police, and media. Politicians can say they are "doing something" and have found a problem for their for their endless solutions, police can make busts and take photo opportunities to justify their existence instead of focusing on real and dangerous crimes, and media can promote whatever agenda they are favoring and sell advertising.

Reminds me of the old mercantile system whereby raw materials, slaves, and rum were the order of the day.

[croaker]

Sex and free enterprise: Two things the government of Massachusetts forbids.

[Ruperttheskeptic]

I write this as a retired prosecutor who worked at all levels of state prosecution except for being the elected prosecutor, and as someone who prosecuted human trafficking and supervised others doing so. Any decision to charge these guys with the Mass. human trafficking law is a gross miscarriage of justice.

Here is what the law says:

"(a) Whoever knowingly: (i) subjects, or attempts to subject, or recruits, entices, harbors, transports, provides or obtains by any means, or attempts to recruit, entice, harbor, transport, provide or obtain by any means, another person to engage in commercial sexual activity . . . or (ii) benefits, financially or by receiving anything of value, as a result of a violation of clause (i), shall be guilty of the crime of trafficking of persons for sexual servitude and shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for not less than 5 years but not more than 20 years and by a fine of not more than $25,000. Such sentence shall not be reduced to less than 5 years, or suspended, nor shall any person convicted under this section be eligible for probation, parole, work release or furlough or receive any deduction from his sentence for good conduct until he shall have served 5 years of such sentence."

This is clearly intended to address causing someone to become a prostitute, i.e. forcing them into prostitution, and to pimping. When the law says "commercial sexual activity" to me that means a continuing activity not just an agreement between a John and hypothetical prostitute for a sex act. I would also note that the sentence here is extremely draconian, and would be almost unbelievably draconian for soliciting an adult prostitute, as a conviction is required result in a prison sentence where they serve five actual years. The ridiculous nature of such charges is underscored by the existence of a specific statute for soliciting a prostitute:

"Whoever solicits or receives compensation for soliciting for a prostitute shall be punished by imprisonment in a house of correction for not more than 2 and one-half years, or by a fine of not less than $1,000 and not more than $5,000 or by both such imprisonment and fine."

Note the lack of language about a mandatory prison sentence or probation not being an option. For this offense, the court can impose a fine or probation instead of jail.

I can imagine back to my days as a supervisory prosecutor (I had about 70 lawyers under me directly or indirectly) and having this pitched to me. It would not have been pretty.

[Granite]

Times have changed. The hounds are loosed and now it’s a buttfuck bonanza for the justice system. Corruption is systemic. The good old boys club is almost impervious to any retaliation. The only thing stopping prosecutors these days is their consciences - and let’s be candid, that’s never been a priority. That means, the sky is the limit - if they want all your money, they simply take it. They don’t like you? They slap you with 20 felonies and make you plead for mercy. Then they take your money, your house, your car, and your will to live. Oh, and your lawyer? He’s in bed with the prosecutor. They may not be having actual intercourse, but they wink and nudge each other all night. Spread the wealth around bitches!

[croaker]

This is why people make killdozers.

[TJJ2000]

And who was the "prostitute" soliciting sexual servitude after the curtain was pulled??????

Sorry; I don't have a police fetish 🙂

[TJJ2000]

Maybe; Just maybe; Those 5-men were setting up a citizens-arrest "sting operation"?? Eh?

[Incredulous]

This is so insanely f'd up on so many levels. Normal human sexuality is criminalized and people are labeled sex traffickers and sex offenders for engaging consensual sex. Their lives might be effectively ruined if they have to register as sex offenders. And it becomes impossible to determine who the truly dangerous sex offenders are.

It's infuriating.

Authoritarianism is all the rage now.

Are we really that much better than the Taliban?

[mtrueman]

I thought anti-trafficking laws were aimed at pimps. Surely other laws apply to Johns,

[dan1650]

Were they setting up a gang bang or one at a time?