Forced prostitution and exploitation are some of the realities that some of the thousands of immigrants who have arrived en masse in New York since last year are experiencing and are waiting for work permits.
Kika Certa -pseudonym-, a Venezuelan who went through this situation three decades ago, has decided to tell her story now to prevent more foreigners from being forced into prostitution, after listening to the alcalde Eric Adams say that newly arrived migrants were driving the sex trade in Corona, highlighted New York Post.
Certain wants women trapped in that situation to know that there is a way out. Her tragedy began when, as a young accountant (CPA) in Caracas, she fell in love with “Daniel,” who convinced her to emigrate to New York in 1992. But she soon found herself Living a nightmare on Roosevelt Avenuealong with others victims coming from Venezuela, Colombia, Mexico, the Philippines and China, between 16 and 40 years old.
“They are still there,” she says about the brothels where “Sandra,” the cousin of the supposed boyfriend who invited her to New York, forced her to work. “If those places are still there, (then) there are women forced to become prostitutes.”
“I slept with 20 men on my first night,” said crying Certa, now 51 years old and mother of three daughters, one of them a law student. Customers paid $35 dollars each. But “I never saw any of that money.”
“I saved $3,000 that I brought here to the United States,” Certa recalled. “I remember leaving the airport and immediately (Sandra) took my passport and my money.”
That woman took her to her home in Queens and told her she was not allowed to leave. “She said Daniel lived there and he owed her a lot of money,” she Certa recalled. “And then she said: “You are going to pay the money and the way you are going to pay is that you will prostitute yourself.”
After several months of being sexually exploited, she finally demanded her passport back and agreed to pay Sandra more money for her freedom. Certain She insists that she was not a prostitute by choice.
It’s been more than 30 years and Certa is still disturbed by the women she sees working in brothels on the same street. “They are not there because they want to be,” said. “It’s because they have been forced in some way and… after they break, there is no way out. It is not a pleasure to sleep with 30 men on Monday, 30 men on Tuesday, 30 men on Wednesday, 30 men on Thursday, 30 men on Friday…”
The wait for the long-awaited legal status seems long for many people: Immigration courts in New York state already had a backlog of 180,000 cases before thousands of immigrants began arriving in 2022.
Meanwhile, it has been repeatedly said that Queens is the capital of prostitution disguised as massages in the US. At the end of 2021, district attorney Melinda Katz warned that Much of the sex trafficking activity occurs near transportation hubs, including airports. And he pointed out that hotels “give a feeling of anonymity.”
In a similar case, in October four members of a Hispanic family living in Queens (NYC) were convicted in Brooklyn of running a prostitution operation of minors brought from Mexico that lasted years and bribing a police officer. One of the victims is a niece of the group’s leader.
Also that month Douglas Welsh was formally charged in the Federal Court of Brooklyn of conspiracy for sex trafficking, promotion of prostitution and brutal violence against their victims.
Days earlier Jacob “Yanky” Daskal, founder of an influential anti-crime group, was sentenced to 17 years in prison after pleading guilty to raping a fifteen-year-old girl placed in his care because of her prominent position in the Orthodox Jewish community of Brooklyn (NYC).
In October, a Hispanic man was found guilty of persuading, inducing and luring sex workers from other states to travel to New Jersey and they will dedicate themselves to prostitution. But when the women demanded payment, he became aggressive, often assaulting and raping them.
In September, Jesús Concepción, a former music teacher at a charter high school in The Bronx (NYC), admitted to sexually abusing five female students in New York, NJ and Connecticut, one of whom was only 12 years old.
In June, Jonathan Luna was sentenced to 12 years in prison and 13 more years of post-release supervision for abusing a child assigned to his care in New York. Also that month, Michael Olson, a financial executive, was accused of raping a 14-year-old girl inside hotel rooms in NYC and providing her with drugs until she overdosed, prosecutors announced.
In April of this year three pimps and three employees of a hotel in The Bronx (NYC) were charged as suspected of running a minor prostitution ring that included forcing a 16-year-old girl to go on 100 “dates” in one year, prosecutors alleged.
In February, a member of the Crips gang was accused of promoting the prostitution of women, including a 14-year-old girl, who were forced to live naked in a house in Staten Island (NYC) and serve him as his servants, according to a federal indictment.
In January Arthur Dawson, a pimp described as one of the “most violent traffickers” prosecuted by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office (NYC), was sentenced to 50 years behind bars for forcing minors into prostitution, some of them recruited via Facebook.
Also in January, Lawrence Winslow and Alan Velvett were sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to rape and sex trafficking of three minors in Queens. The girls were 13, 14 and 15 years old at the time.
In another similar case, in December it was announced that two men from New Jersey They faced long sentences accused of producing child pornography and sexual trafficking of minors. In the fall of 2022, the owner of a motel in Long Island (NY), his wife, son and an employee were arrested and accused of allowing sex trafficking on their premises.
Previously in June 2022, a Hispanic couple was prosecuted in Manhattan (NYC) on suspicion of using violence to force women into prostitution and sell sexual content on OnlyFans.
In February 2022 Burma “Nancy” Rincón, a former Teaneck (NJ) resident who had fled to Colombia, was arrested upon returning to the country on suspicion of running a prostitution ring in New York and New Jersey with Latina women. That same month five members of a Mexican family who operated a family sex trafficking ring from Mexico to NY and other states were sentenced to long prison terms.
He National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) has warned since 2020 about an increase in cases of child pornography by the increased time of adults and children online. If you are a victim or suspect that someone is being abused, especially if it is a minor or elderly:
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2023-11-11 20:18:00
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