Tuesday, September 11, 2001

CASE STUDIES

Lost to sex

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Tens of thousands of children in Hawaii and across North America -- many of them runaways -- fall into prostitution or are sold into the sex trade by exploitative adults, according to a study released yesterday by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania. The study, "The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in the U.S., Canada and Mexico," was funded by the U.S. Department of Justice, the W.T. Grant Foundation, the Fund for Nonviolence and the Research Foundation of the University of Pennsylvania. The report included profiles of juvenile victims and two adult sexual exploiters of children with ties to Hawaii. The profiles, published here, were prepared by Jayne Bopp and the Rev. Pam Vessels of the Life Foundation in Honolulu.

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY BRYANT FUKUTOMI / BFUKUTOMI@STARBULLETIN.COM

'Jenny'

Jenny was born and raised in Hawaii to a working-class family. She is of Portuguese descent and was raised in a single parent home by her father.

History of assault is unknown, although by the age of 12 she had run away about a dozen times. After running away again she went to her friend "Mary's" house in Waimanalo.

There, Mary's mother pimped both Jenny and her own daughter. At the age of 12 Jenny's virginity was sold to an off-duty police officer for $600. Mary's mother put ads in the PennySaver advertising the girls. Mary's mother introduced both girls to ice; by age 13, Jenny was a complete addict.

Between the ages of 12 and 14 Jenny worked at four different hostess bars.

Jenny reported that the owners always knew beforehand when the Liquor Commission or (police) vice officers were coming and would make her put on her clothes and leave during those visits.

The Life Foundation met Jenny through a local youth- outreach project. A trick she had been staying with brought her to the project's medical clinic because she had severe abdominal pain.

Jenny was diagnosed with an advanced case of pelvic inflammatory disease and was told she needed to be hospitalized.

Jenny begged the nurse practitioner not to contact her father, whose permission was needed for the hospitalization. Not knowing what to do the nurse practitioner contacted one of the Life Foundation's senior staff members who took Jenny in and later became her foster mother.

Jenny subsequently was accepted into a local high school and did well for about four months.

Eventually she ran away again and got back into drugs.

Today her whereabouts are unknown.

'Sara'

Sara was born in Canada to an upper-middle-class Caucasian family. The details of her history of sexual assault are unknown. At age 13 she became pregnant and had a baby who... was raised by her parents. At 14 she ran away and got hooked up with a pimp in Vancouver. Her pimp sent her all over to work including Seattle, Salt Lake, Las Vegas, Houston, Pasadena, San Francisco and eventually Honolulu.

While in Honolulu Sara was sent to Japan two times to work. The first time was for three months and the second time for about two months. While there she was "given" to someone else and worked in a hostess-bar-type setting.

Between trips to Japan Sara worked in Honolulu, Las Vegas and Canada. At age 23, Sara left her pimp and returned to Canada. She got pregnant again and had her second child. Today Sara is living with her family, working as a secretary and bartender and raising both of her kids.

'Carrie and Amy'

Carrie and Amy's mother was from Scotland; she married an American GI and came to Hawaii.

Their parents divorced when they were 10 and 11 years old. Their mother starting drinking heavily after the divorce, became homeless and lived on the beach in Waianae. Carrie and Amy were sent to a group home at ages 13 and 14 but would run away on the weekends to be with their mother on the beach. Carrie started working at Wendy's when she was 16.

A pimp would come to the restaurant and flirt with her. Eventually the pimp found their mother and asked if he could have her daughters. In exchange, he would give the mother food and shelter. She accepted.

The pimp trafficked the girls between San Francisco and Hawaii. By the time Carrie was 19 she had had six abortions and one child. Both she and Amy, age 18, were alcoholics.

Today the sisters are in their early 20s. Carrie has two kids; Amy has had five abortions. Both are drug addicts and homeless.

'Linda'

Linda came from a middle-class Caucasian family in Seattle. She was sexually assaulted on a daily basis by a neighbor from ages 9 to 14. Linda ran away from home at age 14 and one day while walking down the street from Jack-in-the-Box she was kidnapped by six men.

They drugged her, beat her and took her to a house where they tied her to a bed and each proceeded to rape her vaginally then anally. That same evening she was taken to a mansion and sold to a pimp. She engaged in street prostitution and escort services in Oregon, Washington and California until she came to Hawaii.

At age 14 she had one abortion. At age 18 she had to have a complete hysterectomy due to all the damage done by constant infections from sexually transmitted disease (STD). At 19 she almost died from severe bowel and intestinal obstruction due to internal damage caused by anal rapes, beatings and STDs.

Linda subsequently became heavily addicted to injection narcotics and worked in Chinatown.

Today Linda is in her early 30s, she has AIDS, still struggles with her opiate addiction and is 100 percent physically and emotionally disabled.

'Tim'

Born in Hawaii of Hawaiian descent, Tim was repeatedly sexually molested and raped by his kumu hula between the ages of 9 and13.

He became a prostitute at the age of 17 and worked escort services on an outer island. Tim became seriously addicted to alcohol and cocaine.

At one point a trick bought him his own small business but Tim lost it as a result of his addiction.

Tim eventually left prostitution, got married and fathered a child.

After his son was killed (in an accident) the marriage dissolved and Tim returned to drugs and sex work.

Today Tim has been sober for six years but returned to prostitution two years ago.

'Trish'

Born in Hawaii of Caucasian decent, Trish was raised by her alcoholic mother in Kailua. As a child, a neighbor (whose family is well known in political circles) sexually assaulted her on a weekly basis. By the time Trish finished intermediate school she was an alcoholic.

She left Hawaii during her junior year of high school and went to New York with a pornography ring. She eventually "hooked up" with an escort service that was also involved in distributing cocaine. The service encouraged her use of cocaine and eventually paid her in cocaine.

After 13 years of sex work and substance abuse Trish was diagnosed with AIDS. Shortly after her return home to Hawaii Trish committed suicide.

'Susan'

Susan, a Caucasian, was raised in foster care by a family headed by a single father in Kentucky from the age of 8.

Her foster father was a minister, and he sexually assaulted her on a regular basis. At age 15 she ran away and hitchhiked to Los Angeles where she met a man who offered her money and a place to sleep if she had sex with him. After that she began working the streets and hooked up with a pimp who physically and sexually assaulted her and introduced her to drugs and alcohol.

From the ages of 15 to 18, Susan worked all over California, Arizona and Nevada. At age 19 she woke up one morning in the Honolulu airport not knowing where she was or how she got there. She worked with a pimp in Honolulu for the next four to five years until her drug use escalated to the point that she couldn't prostitute any more.

For the one year Susan worked with a local agency serving homeless street youth she was sober, productive and even returned to school.

However, Susan eventually was diagnosed with multiple personality disorder and suffered from severe chronic bladder problems. Today Susan is in her early 30s. She is severely mentally ill, a homeless street person, obese and a religious fanatic.

'Cathy'

Born of Hawaiian and Samoan decent, Cathy was born male, to a poor family in Hawaii.

From her earliest memory her father, brothers and uncles sexually assaulted her. Her family allowed, even promoted, other family members and strangers to use her sexually.

When Cathy did not cooperate with this sexual exploitation, she was locked in a closet. At age 12 Cathy ran away and began doing street prostitution as a female.

She attended school as a boy during the day and worked in Chinatown as a female at night.

Amazingly Cathy managed to graduate from intermediate and high school even though she was homeless -- staying with tricks and drug dealers, and a prostitute.

No one at school knew her secret life.

During the summer of her junior year at age 16, and using a fake ID, Cathy went to New York, prostituted and had an underground sex-change operation. She returned to Hawaii and completed her senior year of high school as a female. Cathy remained a prostitute and became seriously addicted to drugs.

She was arrested on drug charges at age 32, and sentenced to Drug Court.

Cathy was diagnosed with multiple-personality disorder, borderline personality and homicidal impulses.

She is under the care of a psychiatrist and has been sober for up to 18 months at a time.

She has been able to maintain legitimate employment and is able to function "normally" when she takes her psychiatric medications.

'BG'

BG is an African-American male in his 50s. He has been a pimp all of his working life. He traffics girls between Los Angeles, Seattle, Honolulu and Vancouver.

He mostly recruits young girls in Vancouver, brings them to Hawaii and keeps all of their legal papers so they can't leave the country.

He drugs them; handcuffs them and then makes them have sex with his dog.

He photographs these sex acts and then uses the photos as blackmail, threatening to send them to magazines or family members.

Other methods of controlling the girls include locking them in a bathroom and making them drink water from the toilet and eat out of dog-food bowls, and walking up and down the "track/strip" while his girls are working -- with the dog he makes them have sex with.

'Tony'

Tony is a 50-year-old African-American male who owns several legitimate businesses in Las Vegas.

He recruits young girls and young professional women. He recruits young homeless girls from the Las Vegas area and sends them to Honolulu to work.

One of the girls the Life Foundation worked with was 15 years old and was forced by Tony to raise one of his children.

He had taken the child away from another one of his prostitutes as punishment for her drug use.

Tony is reported to traffic girls between Nevada, California, New York, the Bahamas, France and South America.