Child Prostitution

Marisela Quintero read the headline. She winced, as if she'd been punched. Emma had been killed. Emma was 17. She had recently been arrested on prostitution-related charges in a Motel 6 parking lot, wearing a skin-hugging tank top, high heels and booty shorts. She'd flashed a fake driver's license and, in her purse, carried eight latex condoms and a bottle of vodka. Photos: Teen prostitution in Las Vegas Quintero, the county's only social worker assigned primarily to child prostitutes, couldn't get her to admit her real name at first.

Marisela Quintero read the headline. She winced, as if she'd been punched. Emma had been killed. Emma was 17. She had recently been arrested on prostitution-related charges in a Motel 6 parking lot, wearing a skin-hugging tank top, high heels and booty shorts. She'd flashed a fake driver's license and, in her purse, carried eight latex condoms and a bottle of vodka. Photos: Teen prostitution in Las Vegas Quintero, the county's only social worker assigned primarily to child prostitutes, couldn't get her to admit her real name at first.

Police have arrested a woman who forced her 13-year-old daughter into prostitution, a spokesman said. Two others arrested were a 36-year-old man who had paid for sex with the girl for the past four years and a woman who acted as an intermediary. Police said the operation, which came to light during an investigation of a murder in the area, ended last week when they raided the house where the encounters took place and found the man with the girl.

Conservative pundits and activists on Wednesday backed away from a young video producer who was arrested with three other men on suspicion of illegally entering the New Orleans office of Democratic Sen. Mary L. Landrieu posing as telephone repairmen. James O'Keefe III, 25, gained celebrity in conservative circles last year for undercover videotapes he made at several offices of the liberal community organizing group ACORN, in which workers appear to give advice on tax evasion, human smuggling and child prostitution.

Federal officials rescued 52 children and arrested nearly 700 people over the last three days in a nationwide crackdown on child prostitution. Almost 1,600 agents and officers took part in the raids, which followed investigations in 36 cities, according to the FBI, local law enforcement agencies and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Included in the arrests were 60 suspected pimps, according to the FBI and local police officials. Authorities say the youngest victim was 10. In Southern California, two children were rescued in Riverside, and four adults were arrested, said Laura Eimiller, an FBI spokeswoman.

Jasmine R. was pimped and sold for sex on this city's streets when she was 17. Then she was arrested and locked up for it. This summer, the 20-year-old stood before a state Senate committee to plead for a new approach to combating underage prostitution. Legislators complied. Some even wept. Without a single "no" vote, the Assembly and Senate passed AB 3042 -- unusually smooth sailing for a bill that enhances prison penalties. Gov.

The Sri Lankan Cabinet has approved new tough laws against child prostitution and raised the age a child can marry from 12 to 18, replacing 100-year-old legislation, Justice Minister G.L. Peiris said Saturday. The new laws will deal with trafficking in women and children and the exploitation of children, including child pornography.

A 50-year-old convicted California child molester, testifying Thursday before a Senate panel, offered a chilling confession of how he victimized young girls for nearly 30 years, bribing and pleading to coerce them into having sex with him. Surrounded by U.S.

In the first international conference of its kind, officials and child advocates from around the world plotted strategies to abolish the multibillion-dollar child sex industry. Delegates from 130 countries meeting in Stockholm drafted a plan to attack those who force children into prostitution or profit from their abuse. This month's excavation of the bodies of girls allegedly killed by a child pornography ring in Belgium added urgency to the effort.

Prostitution rings from New York to Hawaii forced more than 30 children as young as 12 to have sex at truck stops, hotels and brothels, Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales said Friday, announcing a government crackdown. Nineteen people have been arrested among 31 who have been indicted on charges of sexual trafficking in children, taking minors across state lines for prostitution and other crimes, Gonzales said.

An activist whose undercover videotapes of the community-organizing group ACORN turned him into a conservative folk hero was arrested with three other men who allegedly posed as telephone repairmen to illegally enter Democratic Sen. Mary L. Landrieu's office in New Orleans. According to a federal affidavit unsealed Tuesday, James O'Keefe III, 25, was among four men charged a day earlier with entering federal property under false pretenses to commit a felony after they told an aide to the senator that they needed access to the office's main phone line.

More than a month after the FBI announced it had rescued 52 children from "sexual slavery" in a nationwide crackdown on child prostitution, none of the victims is receiving the help experts say is necessary to overcome such trauma and rejoin society. At least one, a 15-year-old Sacramento girl held on an unrelated charge, remains in a juvenile detention center, according to a Los Angeles Times check of the children's situations. Others have been sent home or into foster care. The victims need intensive residential treatment, experts say, and only three such programs exist in the country.

Hannah Giles was in the middle of her guerrilla warfare lecture this weekend at the young conservatives leadership conference when a man in the audience interrupted her. "We love you!" he cried out. The crowd erupted in applause and whistles. "Aw," Giles said into the microphone. "I love you guys too." At age 20, Giles is a rock star of conservative activism. She shot onto the national scene in September after posing as a prostitute at ACORN offices around the country, where she secretly videotaped employees who appeared to give her advice on tax evasion, human smuggling and child prostitution.

Federal officials rescued 52 children and arrested nearly 700 people over the last three days in a nationwide crackdown on child prostitution. Almost 1,600 agents and officers took part in the raids, which followed investigations in 36 cities, according to the FBI, local law enforcement agencies and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Included in the arrests were 60 suspected pimps, according to the FBI and local police officials. Authorities say the youngest victim was 10. In Southern California, two children were rescued in Riverside, and four adults were arrested, said Laura Eimiller, an FBI spokeswoman.

Prostitution rings from New York to Hawaii forced more than 30 children as young as 12 to have sex at truck stops, hotels and brothels, Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales said Friday, announcing a government crackdown. Nineteen people have been arrested among 31 who have been indicted on charges of sexual trafficking in children, taking minors across state lines for prostitution and other crimes, Gonzales said.

Jasmine R. was pimped and sold for sex on this city's streets when she was 17. Then she was arrested and locked up for it. This summer, the 20-year-old stood before a state Senate committee to plead for a new approach to combating underage prostitution. Legislators complied. Some even wept. Without a single "no" vote, the Assembly and Senate passed AB 3042 -- unusually smooth sailing for a bill that enhances prison penalties. Gov.

She is only 16. Leaning on the wall of a fast-food store and smoking a cigarette, she looks just like any Taiwan high school girl waiting for friends. A man comes along. They talk for a while, stroll among the shopping crowds and then enter a "love hotel" nearby. She is one of the "fallen wings," the local expression for young prostitutes aged 12 to 18.

Three sixth-grade girls were discovered locked up in a Tokyo condominium Thursday along with a corpse after a fourth classmate escaped and called for help in the latest high-profile crime involving children to rock Japan. When police arrived at the apartment just a few blocks from the prime minister's residence, they found the girls handcuffed in different bedrooms and the body of one of the suspected abductors in the living room, an apparent suicide.