The vast majority of underage sex workers got into it because they were abused and manipulated by adults (usually starting with their families, who abused them to the point of making them run away in self defense) and had no other means to find legal work to keep themselves alive. Pimps trolley bus stations, etc., looking for new, vulnerable youngsters to swoop down on. These are not free agents who chose to join the profession, and usually don’t have the ability to leave it (thanks to those same pimps, plus the corrupt LEOs don’t help either).
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However, she’s no longer a minor. Anyway, without testimony it’s hard to prosecute.
I once called the cops on a neighbor who was beating the crap out of his non-English speaking girlfriend. I got a supoena via USPS, which is unenforceable btw. I called the county D.A.'s office because while I really wanted to testify, I had nonrefundable plane tickets (husband, mom, and myself) for a trip to France. The A.D.A. told me to go and not feel guilty because most likely it would not have resulted in a guilty verdict since girlfriend refused to testify and flew back to South Korea.
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She can be brought to court to verify her age. Then people who had knowledge can testify as to the date of the incidents.
Besides, since when do we decide not to attempt to prosecute crimes just because time as passed and a witness is not friendly to the idea. I thought if the state had knowledge and evidence of the crime it was the responsibility of the state to test that evidence in court.
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I’m just telling you what happened when I witnessed a man physically assault a woman. She refused to testify and our system allows for a defendant to face his accusers. Without testimony from victim, there’s no cross examination. This is what the A.D.A. told me when I talked to him. My brother, who is also a California attorney, concurred when I asked him about this (I just wanted to make sure what the prosecutor was telling me was completely correct).
As for statute of limitations, I have no idea.
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IANAL, but the section here under Criminal Prosecutions for Sexual Abuse appears to be the relevant information pertaining to sexual assault cases.
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Nancy O’Malley’s office has a reputation in California for strong advocacy on behalf of survivors of sexual assault. OTOH, like all prosecutors, that office must depend on a close working relationship with law enforcement. It may be that the office would welcome expression of support for perpetrator accountability in this case.
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The officers’ misconduct – which included on-duty sexting with Guap – was repeatedly raised to Oakland police supervisors, who did nothing to put a stop to it.
“misconduct”? “scandal”?
These are crimes that require prosecution, not oopsies that need apologizing (though apology would be a start)
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The people likely to rape sex workers are the people likely to keep it illegal.
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Three in eight days?
This is starting to sound like the last season of The Wire.
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Does the mayor agree that law enforcement raping kids in Alameda County communities is a systemic, ongoing risk of harm?
The issue can be tough to investigate. Even professional journalists rarely understand rape and sex trafficking laws and policies. And law enforcement agencies can be insular.
Help is often needed to adequately understand and investigate issues like consent, low reporting rates, why confidential reporting is important, access to free rape kits and so on. In California, law enforcement gatekeeping of rape kits is an especially troubling but rigorously ignored problem.
U.S. DOJ investigative memoranda and reports about police departments in other communities, like Ferguson are good howto templates for investigation — like instruction manuals almost.
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