Gathering Fights Those Who Deal in Human Lives

“Reina” was living with her abusive father when a charming stranger appeared in her Mexican village with promises of a good job in the United States.

Instead, he allegedly forced the 15-year-old to serve as a prostitute for as many as 50 men a day in rural San Diego camps along with girls as young as 12.

This grim byproduct of globalization will bring together local law enforcement officers, social workers and human rights activists from both sides of the border for a two-day conference beginning Monday to discuss combating the international traffic in women and children.

According to the U.S. State Department’s Office to Combat Trafficking in Persons, about 700,000 people--most of them women and children--are trafficked across international borders worldwide each year. As many as 50,000 land in the United States, and California is a prime destination.

“We’ve got to join together and stop their exploitation,” said Marisa Ugarte, Reina’s former counselor and chairwoman of the Safety Corridor Coalition, which organized the conference.

“It’s a huge problem,” said Manolo Guillen, program manager of San Diego Youth and Community Services, a member of the coalition that provided Reina, now 17, with safe housing until she was moved to another state two months ago.

Christopher Tenorio, an assistant U.S. attorney in San Diego, will speak Monday on new avenues for prosecuting criminals opened by the 2000 Trafficking and Violence Protection Act. The measure strengthened legal statutes, increased penalties and filled legal loopholes.

“It’s easier now to prove exploitation of juveniles forced into commercial sex acts,” Tenorio said. “Now, if it involves juveniles in commercial sex acts, we don’t have to prove violence [was used to coerce them].”

The legislation also provided money for certified victims of trafficking, and created a special U.S. “T visa” that allows those eligible to remain in the country permanently. There’s a hotline--(888) 428-7581--to report illegal dealing in human beings.

“What I’m really trying to do is let victims know they have resources here, and if they come forward, there’s protection,” Tenorio said.

Other speakers at the conference, which was also held last year, will include local directors of the Immigration and Naturalization Service and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, as well as Mexican human rights officers who specialize in the trafficking in women and children. Author and child-trafficking expert Richard Estes will field questions.

The conference will be held at the Recital Hall in Balboa Park--a scenic preserve that was the site of a 1993 scandal involving immigrant boys, some as young as 9, who survived by prostituting themselves to American men in business suits and BMWs.

Tenorio said law enforcement officers had been discussing trafficking issues for a year when they decided to meet with the Safety Corridor Coalition, composed mostly of social service agencies.

“You see, this is really unique and you need to work together,” he said. “These are people who can take care of the psychological and medical needs of the victims.”

Kelly Hill, founder of Hawaii-based Sisters Offering Support, will discuss psychological issues facing children pushed into prostitution. She once counseled a 12-year-old girl.

“It’s never the kids’ choice,” Hill said. “They’re put in a situation where they feel they can’t say no.”

Liz Pleitez Christie, program manager for a Planned Parenthood migrant outreach program in Escondido, said she met 12-and 13-year-old girls working at “sex camps” in northern San Diego County. “It’s real easy to go down into Mexico and Central America into these little communities and say, ‘I can get you a really good job as a nanny or a housekeeper in the United States,’ ” she said. “When they get here, they’re forced to have sex.”

Typically, she said, men learn by word of mouth when prostitutes will be available some weekend at an old ranch. Prostitutes are told that “if they leave, they will find where they are and kill them,” she said. “They say they’ll tell their families and their little communities what kind of work they’re doing.”

It was at such a camp that Pleitez Christie first crossed paths with Reina. The man who brought Reina from central Mexico kidnapped her 4-month-old son, telling her she would never see him again if she refused to work for him, authorities said.

But eventually, in December 2000, Reina ran to a nearby home and asked for help. The next day a San Diego County sheriff’s deputy told Deputy Rick Castro in Vista that he had picked up a girl--Reina--who said she was forced into prostitution.

Castro conducted surveillance and counted vans driving in and out of the Oceanside camp, “like a shuttle service,” bringing about 300 men who paid $15 to $20 each for visits with six girls, he said.

The pimps had lookouts, cell phones and two-way radios, Castro said. He said the ring involved 30 to 40 young women, half of them younger than 18, some only 12.

Deputies descended on the camp and picked up 15 young women. They arrested 30 men, but federal prosecutors had trouble building cases “because the girls were so intimidated,” he said.

One young woman who tried to flee the ring was beaten for two hours with a clothes hanger in front of the other girls, he said. Castro said pimps were holding other women’s children too.

More than half the men were simply deported, he said--and the investigation remains open.

“San Diego being so close to the border is making it a prime spot for sex trafficking in minors, but it’s overlooked,” said Castro, who plans to attend the conference.

“If you don’t ask the right questions, law enforcement is not going to realize the girls are being forced into prostitution,” he said. “We need to wake people up about this. It’s become a big business.”

Investigators found Reina’s son with her captor’s relatives, and mother and child were finally reunited in May.

While she waited, she spoke about her ordeal to about 100 people at a conference on human trafficking at the University of San Diego, disguising her identify with a yellow silk veil.

Her captor is still at large, authorities say.