Indigenous and Latina Women & Children's Human Rights News from the Americas

  This Section Last Updated on July 31, 2009

About the Child Rape Camps of San Diego County, California - A Crime Against Humanity inside the U.S.A.

The articles here below describe one of the largest known child and youth sex trafficking cases in the United States to date.  In one of several related cases, hundreds of Mexican girls between 7 and 18 were kidnapped or subjected to false romantic entrapment by organized criminal sex trafficking gangs.  Victims were then brought to San Diego County, California.  Over a 10 year period these girls were raped by hundreds of men per day in more than 2 dozen home based and agricultural camp based brothels.     

A Latina medical doctor employed by a U.S. federal agency provided condoms to the victims for years, and was told by her supervisors not to speak out and organize efforts to rescue the victims.  This doctor was ordered under threat of legal action to keep quiet about the mass victimization of children in "rape camps."  

When a joint FBI, INS and San Diego Sheriff's raid was finally organized and executed, ten years after local law enforcement first learned about local trafficking, many of  the criminal traffickers and johns escaped.  The 50 johns and traffickers who were captured were later released when the intimidated child victims refused to accuse their enslavers.  Most of the victims were then deported to Mexico without being provided with any victim services.

A number of murdered immigrant teen girls have been found in San Diego, possibly linked to trafficking rings.

The San Diego child sex trafficking case continues to evolve.  In June, 2003 one of the key trafficking ringleaders was convicted of a charge that would bring him 18 months in jail.  The rural rape camps continue to exist and were filmed by a local TV station (see below).

The San Diego Sex Trafficking Case deserves the full attention of the criminal justice system, social service providers and victim advocates.  Previous to the notoriety of this case, anti-trafficking advocates noted that some concerned members of Congress and other decision makers would ask "if 50,000 enslaved persons are trafficked into the U.S. each year, where are they?"

That question still needs to be researched and answered on a national basis.  In the present, the San Diego case provides the "smoking gun" that documents the true horror of the Latin America to U.S. trafficking crisis.  

The San Diego case represents a large tip of the national trafficking 'iceberg,' and this case must be addressed with aggressive legal zeal.  The San Diego child sex trafficking case is a true abomination in the eyes of the creator and in the eyes of the entire the human race!  

Failure to deal with this case effectively will send a clear  message to traffickers that the U.S. does not care about the lives and mass-rape of the hundreds of 7 to 18 year old girls who have been, and are today, victimized in this international criminal enterprise.  To accomplish an end to such trafficking, cross-cultural compassion and an end to anti-immigrant hostility in U.S. society will have to take place.  Otherwise, such hostility and apathy will allow  traffickers to continue their criminal violence against these victimized women and children with impunity. 

End criminal impunity now!

LibertadLatina.org

Latest San Diego Related News Added: July 31, 2009 Mexico, California, USA Lured To Mexico, Young Girls Often Unable To Return San Diego - Seven months into the year and already 139 underage girls have been reported missing in San Diego. Some are runaways, some return home on their own. Others are lured to a place difficult even for police to track, where they are stuck in a life far different from their dreams. From there, even one rescue is a success. Nearly 2 months after her 14-year-old daughter disappeared, one lucky mother got word her daughter was found in the interior of Mexico. “My heart is happy, happy,” said Francisca Guabarrama. 10News waited with Guabarrama, at the International Border until the wee hours of the morning. The transfer was being coordinated by an international rescue agency. Finally, word came to Guabarrama that her daughter was clearing customs. Her daughter beat the odds and made it back. Law enforcement sources told 10News the girl met an older boy on My-Space, who was believed to be linked to a National City gang. “Some of these girls leave with people we suspect to be gang members that do have ties to organized crime in Mexico,” said National City Police Detective, Antonio Ybarra. The two agreed to meet at Kimball Park on June 2, 2009. Like many other cases, the girl ended up in Mexico, alone and unable to get home, police said. None of several other girls believed to be in Mexico has been found. “The farther you go into the interior of Mexico, the more difficult that becomes,” said National City Police Sergeant, Mike Harlan. What's happening to them is frightening. “We have some cases that are active where's there's prostitution, human trafficking. They're used for transporting narcotics and we're not able to get to them,” said Ybarra. The Guabarrama’s happy ending almost didn't happen. “They went into hiding,” said former San Diego District Attorney Investigator, Juan Briones, who is now with the Bilateral Safety Corridor Coalition. He was sent to Guadalajara because he has almost 20 years experience with international missing person's cases. He went down to bring Guabarrama back home. “The victim somehow feels powerless and that they need help,” Briones said. Briones said he threatened criminal charges against the men living in the home with the young girl and they eventually released her. “It’s difficult to get to these kids to understand,” Ybarra said, “that where you and I can go to any pay phone and dial 9-1-1 and get police service, it does not work that way over there.” While one girl has been given another chance, many others remain in danger south of the border. Law enforcement sources say the cooperation between Mexican and U.S. law enforcement agencies has improved in recent years, but it still takes time to get a minor home. “If a young girl has already slipped into the hands of a cartel to be sold into prostitution and drug running, it's, at the very least, extremely difficult to ever reach her,” Briones said. www.News10.com July 29, 2009 Added July 5, 2008 Mexico  En desventaja, niños mexicanos indocumentados Mexico's Undocumented Migrant Children are at a Disadvantage for Refugee Benefits Thousands of Children Cross Alone into the U.S. Each Year to Escape Child Sex Trafficking Networks Many of the 80,000 Mexican children who cross from Mexico into the U.S. alone, as undocumented immigrants, are fleeing abuse at home, or are escaping from child prostitution rings. As such, they would possibly qualify for permission to stay in the United States. These children would be able to avail themselves of this opportunity if U.S. Border Patrol officers would provide them with the appropriate interview form, as federal law requires. Instead, they minors are typically deported in less than 24 hours after their arrests. This is the reality facing children at risk, as described by attorney Christopher Nugent. For many years, Nugent, of the law firm Holland and Knight, has represented Mexican and Central American children and adults with immigration problems. His work has been pro bono. The Border Patrol treats unaccompanied Central American children differently from Mexican children arrested as undocumented migrants. They are held for 72 hours before a decision is made to deport them. They are taken to a juvenile detention center where they are given access to lawyers. Nugent estimates that approximately 20,000 Central American children each year cross into the United States... "There are many Mexican children who qualify to receive asylum… most minors are between 13 and 17 years, but are also 10-year-olds who migrate alone" said Nugent, who regretted the fact that these Mexican children are not given the option to talk with lawyers or with the Mexican consulate. ...Thousands of Mexican and Central American children flee northward into the U.S. each year to escape child prostitution... Nugent explained how in Mexico there exists terrible child trafficking in the area of Acapulco, Guerrero, and that many now call this region "the new Bangkok" of child sex tourism. Nugent also emphasized that Tijuana [on the U.S. border with San Diego County] has also become an zone controlled by powerful child prostitution networks. Many children [in prostitution] from Tijuana are trying to flee to San Diego. According to Nugent 70 percent of children who migrate and come to the Office of Refugees in the United States have suffered some sort of trauma from violence or sexual exploitation... [Expanded Translation]   Georgina Olson Excélsior July 3, 2008 Added Jan. 22, 2008 California, USA Respected anti-trafficking activist opposes nomination of new police chief due to past failure to act against child sex trafficking in migrant labor camps John Monti, member of Save Our State, appeared before the City Council of San Diego on January 22, 2008 to oppose the appointment of Captain Boyd Long, San Diego Police Department, as assistant police chief of the department. Monti said, “My opposition is based on the complete denial of what has been happening and has happened in McGonigle Canyon.” Monti  displayed a red backpack in the council which was found in McGongicle Canyon when girls were brought to be prostituted at a well-known “prostibulo,” outdoor prostitution area, in the part of the canyon known as  “Los Diablos” by the migrants. The backpack contained lubricant, contraceptives and tissue paper and had belonged to an unknown prostituted girl. "To deny that there is a problem is silence – it is a silence that equals death,” thundered Monti. Monti is alarmed that knowledge of the human trafficking and forced prostitution of women and children is being suppressed by law enforcement and open-borders activists. “Those girls are equally deserving of protection as anyone else in our country – legal or illegal. If we say there is no problem when there is – we create victims and more victims, because no one will know this is going on. If it is to be stopped the public must know so they can identify victims when they see them.” - John Monti Activist Jan. 21, 2008 LibertadLatina note: John Monti, a bilingual middle school teacher with close ties to the Latino community, is one of the most effective activists against child sex trafficking as it occurs in San Diego County, California.  San Diego is where the infamous child rape camps, discussed on this web site, are located.  John Monti's work calls into question why, after 100's of thousands of dollars in anti-trafficking funds were given to law enforcement in the region, child and youth sex trafficking remains largely uncontested. - Chuck Goolsby Jan. 22, 2008 LibertadLatina See also: An alternative view of the child rape camps of rural San Diego County is presented by this article about migrants in McGonagle Canyon and anti-trafficking activism. "What has gotten [the] San Diego Minutemen] the most mainstream mileage is its scary claim that the migrants of McGonigle run a child prostitution ring in one corner of the canyon..." - Casey Sánchez Southern Poverty Law Center Aug.23, 2007 LibertadLatina note: We differ strongly with Casey Sánchez' dismissive conclusion that child sex trafficking is a non-existent problem in McGonigle canyon. The San Diego child sex trafficking crisis is an extension of the vast network of child prostitution that sees 900 or more children and youth, some as young as age seven, forced into prostitution in Tijuana, just blocks from the the San Diego County line. Added November 2, 2005 The Oprah Winfrey Show November 2, 2005 The OPRAH Show presented a special report on the sale of children into sexual slavery globally and within the U.S. This report has been posted in Web format Online at: Human Trafficking: The Preventable Disaster. Featuring: Investigation by CNN's Christiane Amanpour Discussion with Puerto Rican Pop Star and Trafficked Children's Advocate Ricky Martin Write letters to Congress! Thank you, Oprah Winfrey! Dear Oprah Winfrey, Thank you for doing an excellent job during your November 2, 2005 show.  Together with CNN Chief Foreign Correspondent Christiane Amanpour and Puerto Rican pop star and children's advocate Ricky Martin, you did much to raise awareness about the issue of trafficking. Among other issues discussed, the sex trafficking of children from in Tijuana, Mexico, and across the international border into San Diego County, California was also discussed.  The 'reed fields' - the open-air brothels in the San Luis Rey dry riverbed that were once the heart of the 'San Diego Child Rape Camps' - were shown and discussed during a taped segment interviewing San Diego Deputy Sheriff Rick Castro. Most importantly, Oprah, you encouraged the American public to write to each of these congressional representatives (one congressperson and two senators), to insist that the U.S. government make trafficking a higher priority than it is now. I am especially concerned that, when grass-roots activists such as the members of the non-profit group 'Los Cristeros' - who have staked-out trafficking operations, have their information apparently ignored, even when they have brought clearly credible reports of child brothel operations to San Diego County Sheriff's Department and the local FBI office for action.  Why were the child sex slaves involved not rescued?  I don't understand. Why, in late 2005, are children still being smuggled in from Mexico, forced as slaves to provide sex for thousands of men in San Diego County, California?  Why? Thanks to your efforts, the United States is coming closer to the day when these child rape camps, and similar criminal operations around the United States, will be shut down. Keep up the great work, Oprah!  We support your efforts 100%! Sincerely, - Chuck Goolsby LibertadLatina November 2, 2005 Added June 8, 2005  Slate.com Reiterates its 2004 Criticism of the Anti-Slavery Movement, 16 Months After First Attacking Reporter Peter Landesman's Groundbreaking Article on Mexico to U.S. Child Sex Trafficking in the New York Times: The Girls Next Door.  Activists Respond. "Where are these people [slavery victims in the U.S.]? If in fact the numbers are accurate, there may be over 250,000 or more here, trapped, sick and confused." LibertadLatina Note: The Girls Next Door directly addressed the issue of the mass kidnapping of underage girl children from Mexico for exploitation as enslaved prostitutes in San Diego, California. Added May 23, 2005  California Anti-Trafficking Group Los Cristeros Post TV Network News Report Showing  Hidden Camera Footage of Child Prostitution in Tijuana (Often Catering to U.S. Tourists) and in San Diego, California. May 18, 2005  San Diego Child Rape Camps Crisis: Guillermo Romero Flores, 45, and Guadalupe Ventura, 28,  Were Convicted in San Diego Federal Court in Relation to a 2001 Raid of a Brothel Operating in Reeds on the Banks of the San Luis Rey River. The Two Face a Maximum of 10 Years in Prison at a Sentencing Hearing in August. April 5, 2005  New Study Finds 5,000 Children are at Risk of Being Forced into Prostitution in Mexican Border City of Tijuana, Near San Diego, California.  Child Sex Trafficking is Growing Rapidly. (This Large Group of Children is At Risk of Being Kidnapped into the Child Rape Camps of San Diego, California.) April 5, 2005  Three Carreto Family Suspects Plead Guilty to All 27 Counts in New York City Trafficking Trial. April 4, 2005  New York - Carreto Gang Trial Begins: Homes in Queens, New York Were Prisons for Latin Sex Slaves. Young Prostitutes in Tijuana's Red Zone. © Warga News 04/03/2005  New York Daily News Article Describes the Kidnapping and Enslavement of Girls From Age 8 Who are 'Broken In' On Tijuana, Mexico Streets Before Being Sent to Brothels in New York City. Brooklyn Federal Case Against the Notorious Carreto Family Sex Slavery Gang to Begin March 4, 2005. 04/03/2005  Mexican Women Set to Testify Against Carreto Family Traffickers in Brooklyn Court. Added 03/31/ 2005  Grassroots Advocacy Group Los Cristeros 'Again' Demand Police Action (As Do We) For Child Sex Slaves Kidnapped from Mexico and Held in Del Mar (San Diego County, California) Outdoor Brothel Sitting Near $600,000 Homes.  Los Cristeros Request F.B.I. Assistance to Rescue Minor Girl Slaves from Known Brothels Long Ago Reported to Local Sheriffs. Added 02/23/ 2004  Mexican Authorities Arrest New_York Slavery Ring. March 31, 2005  Grassroots Advocacy Group Los Cristeros 'Again' Demand Police Action (As Do We at LibertadLatina) For Child Sex Slaves Kidnapped from Mexico and Held in Del Mar (in San Diego County, California) Brothels Sitting Near $600,000 Homes. Joaquin Santiago of Los Cristeros: [About efforts to get local law enforcement to React to Brothels where children kidnapped from Mexico are repeatedly raped for profit]. Excerpt: We had the date, time, and place of this prostibulo, yet no one arrived to help the girls. And, it is still in operation. Moreover, the pimps had been trafficking these girls on that same date and time for some time. I'm sure there was surveillance in place, but I guess if you are an undocumented Mexican girl you are a low priority. Call the F.B.I. and ask if the Hostage Rescue Team is busy with anything more pressing than this, because this is a "critical incident." Since nothing came of [providing law enforcement with] this information I feel it is in the interest of exposing the problem to show where it is happening so the girls can be given a chance to get their freedom back and the afflicted communities can remove this cancer. March 30, 2005  San Diego California Child Rape Camps Crisis: CNN Reports on the San Diego, California Sex Slavery Crisis and the Recently Formed Task Force Created to Combat Trafficking. March 30, 2005  San Diego California Child Rape Camps Crisis: Law Enforcement Task Force to Prosecute Sex-Trade, Slavery Cases: "750,000 Women Have Been Trafficked Into the U.S. In the Last Decade." Added 03/12/ 2005  San Diego, California Child Rape Camps-Town Hall Meeting; Regional Police Dept.'s Awarded $448,000 in 2004 by U.S. DOJ to Fight Traffickers. [San Diego County] Sheriff Bill Kolender and other law enforcement officials are creating a regional task force to prosecute those who buy or sell people for sexual exploitation or forced labor. The problem is poorly documented in San Diego County because many officers are not adequately trained to spot it, authorities said yesterday in announcing the formation of the Human Trafficking Task Force. There have been roughly a dozen cases of such trafficking prosecuted since 2003, but hundreds of such crimes, Deputy Rick Castro said. He has focused on such activity in North County since 1996. "I personally let more than 100 victims go, from 1996 through 1998, without recognizing what I had," Castro said... March 8, 2005 - International Women's Day   LibertadLatina.org comments in our 2005, 4th Anniversary and International Women's Day Statement: Defending 'Maria' from Impunity - about the ongoing child rape crisis in San Diego County.   March 8, 2005 LibertadLatina.org Excerpt 1: If the well known and unfortunate White American child kidnap and murder victims such as Polly Klass, Megan Kanca and Carlie Brucia (may they rest in peace) had been known to have been trapped in a child rape camp in San Diego, California, or in a residential brothel in Queens, New York run by sex traffickers, helicopters and hundreds of police and volunteers would have quickly rescued them.  Yet in San Diego County, California, 12 year old kidnapped 'little brown Maria' is trapped in a brothel.  It is known to activists and others that she will not be rescued by law enforcement.  Why? The San Diego rape camps have been known to federal and local law enforcement for over ten years.  Ten years after learning about the camps, federal, state and local law enforcement conducted a raid of the worst open-air child rape camps.  The raid resulted in no convictions of the 40 men apprehended.  The 47 enslaved underage girl victims remained silent because they had been threatened with harm to themselves, to their families and to their children, who are sometimes held hostage by traffickers. U.S. federal, state and local law enforcement today know exactly where the traffickers are pimping underage girls who have been kidnapped from Mexico.  Yet we see no visible efforts to rescue victims.  Therefore, We the People must stand and act in their defense.  Only We the People can pressure our governments to shut down the child rape camps of San Diego County and across the Americas and the World.  LibertadLatina would like to see the public join together to hold governments accountable for these child rape camps.  We look forward to seeing real results from the $2 million in federal grants sent in 2004 to San Diego based advocacy agencies and law enforcement.  The victims are waiting! San Diego is part of a growing ‘zone of impunity’ that is emerging in the U.S.-Mexican border region. Centuries of anti-Indigenous and anti-Latina sexual exploitation is now enabling ruthless traffickers. Excerpt 2: Within the United States, anti-immigrant hostility, Spanish/English language barriers, machismo, official indifference and a lack of political will appear to be 'binding the hands' of those concerned law enforcement officials who would like to shut down the rape camps and sex slavery brothels that now exist across the United States.  Even in instances where officials know where sex slavery exists, the 'rules of engagement' and the politics of police work sometimes cause police not to act to rescue victims.  Activist organizations such as Polaris Project are starting to educate local police departments about best practices in how to respond effectively to human slavery cases.  The U.S. Department of Justice is now funding regional anti-trafficking task forces across the United States.  Non-profit agencies are being well funded to assist victims.  The United States, the United Nations and the Organization of American States are now funding initiatives to fight trafficking in Latin America. Yet San Diego's child rape camps continue to exist.  Under-staffed local law enforcement is fighting a loosing battle with Tijuana, Mexico based traffickers.  Gangs continue to kidnap and enslave young girls with impunity because they know that U.S. law enforcement won't or can’t act to shut down the child rape camps and save lives!  Across Latin America institutional sexism (and classism and racism), official corruption and the huge profits available from sex trafficking allow these criminals to operate in safety.  Leadership from the grassroots will be critical to change these realities.  Governments will not act unless they are pushed to do so.  We the People must unite and demand effective action now!   Latest San Diego News - Added February 28, 2005 Convicted Sex Trafficker Luciano Salazar Released From Prison on a Technicality Anti-trafficking activists have reported that the one and only member of the infamous Salazar Brothers Child Sex trafficking gang ever to be jailed - Luciano Salazar-Juarez, was released early on a technicality from a two year prison sentence in January, 2005.  LibertadLatina.org has not seen this reported release mentioned in the press, but we believe the report to be credible. On June 19, 2003, Luciano Salazar-Juarez pleaded guilty to conspiracy, harboring aliens and transporting undocumented immigrants. Salazar-Juarez arranged for the smuggling of Guillermina Hernandez-Ramos into the United States. He rented an apartment for her and another immigrant woman for the purpose of engaging in prostitution.  Both women drowned while attempting to drive through a flooded road near a known farm labor prostitution site.  On October 8, 2003 Luciano Salazar-Juarez was sentenced to 2 years in jail for his crimes. Salazar-Juarez is apparently living in Tijuana, Mexico, the staging area for transporting trafficking victims across the border into San Diego County, California.    See the below articles in regard to Luciano Salazar: [The San Diego, California community of] Vista named in 'sex slave' repor0 01-24-2004 VISTA ---- An article in Sunday's New York Times Magazine that portrays this North County city as a hub for crime rings that force young girls into prostitution is probably accurate, local and county officials said this week. Prostitution Smuggler Gets Two Years in Jail - 10-08-2003 Mexican man pleads guilty to smuggling, harboring women as prostitutes - 6/2003 Man Admits Guilt To Smuggling Prostitutes Luciano Salizar Pleads Guilty - 06-20-2003 The groundbreaking January 2003 article in El Universal newspaper (in English and Spanish) that first told the story of Luciano Salazar's involvement with his brother's child sex slavery operation - 01-09-2003. Other Recently Added Articles Speaker: North County a hot spot in migrant sex trade (Marisa Ugarte, Executive Director of the Bilateral Safety Corridor Coalition, spoke at the Bravo Foundation's Speaker Series Luncheon at the California Center for the Arts in Escondido - April 28, 2004.)

Dec. 13, 2004

Tijuana Newspaper Describes Ongoing Sexual Enslavement of Minor Girls from the Age of 14 in Forced Prostitution for Farm Workers at [Child Rape] Camps Across San Diego County, California.

San Diego, California

BSCC News and Events

For more information, contact Marisa Ugarte at
mubava@msn.com or 619-260-0105

Speakers
Mohamed Mattar, Protection Project
Norma Hotaling, Director of Sage
Chris Tenorio, US Department of Justice
Donna Hughes, University of Rhode Island

http://www.bsccoalition.org/BSCC/

- Dr. Melissa Farley, Director, Prostitution Research, San Francisco Women's Center

And...

I am sending big congratulations to Marissa Ugarte and the Bilateral Safety Corridor Coalition for a successful conference last week in San Diego, California. "Parallel Worlds: Tijuana and San Diego" brought together government officials, service providers, researchers, and activists from the U.S., Mexico, and Central America to talk about the problems of trafficking of women and children for sexual exploitation and sex tourism.

One of the most compelling presentations was the investigative news report from a local TV channel on the trafficking and prostitution of girls in what is known as the "strawberry fields." From hidden locations they were able to film the pimps bringing the girls into the fields and the men arriving at the parking lot, then being taken into the hills to use (rape) the girls. They caught on film the exchange of money between men and pimps and even the acts of prostitution. They filmed the grass dens and pathways constructed by the pimps in what amounts to an open-air brothel.

The presentations were all very high quality and often on the cutting edge of the movement against trafficking. 

- Dr. Donna M. Hughes holds the Carlson Endowed Chair in Women's Studies at the University of Rhode Island.

1st Annual Candlelight Vigil:
September 28 in San Diego, CA

http://www.bsccoalition.org/BSCC/

SAN DIEGO - Mexican man pleads guilty to smuggling, harboring women as prostitutes - Associated Press - 6/2003

(Two News Stories)

San Diego - Sexual Slavery - 2002 - A law enforcement team.. burst open a criminal ring smuggling young Mexican girls into northern San Diego County... forcing them to work as prostitutes, serving hundreds of men who were being shuttled to a remote camp on a given day.
  
...More than 40 people were arrested, and 16 young women and teens who had been held as sex slaves were rescued... 
  
...``Because of the high intimidation factor, we were unable to get the evidence we needed to charge [the suspects]."
  
...The case in Oceanside came to light after a 15-year-old girl fled to a private home and sought help. The girl, identified only by her first name, Reina, was recruited from a central Mexican village with promises of a good job.
  
...But then her captors took her infant son away from her and threatened to harm him unless she prostituted herself.

(c) 2002 Associated Press - 08/29/2002

Humanitarian Sexploitation: The World's Sex Slaves Need Liberation, not Condoms - An editorial  piece in The Weekly Standard by Dr. Donna Hughes - 02/24/2003

"An anonymous American doctor who worked for a community health clinic that provided health care to migrant workers said, "The first time I went to the camps I didn't vomit only because I had nothing in my stomach. It was truly grotesque and unimaginable." Over time, the girls got younger; a number were 9 and 10 years old. One time, the doctor counted 35 men using a girl in one hour. When the police raided the brothels, they found dozens of empty boxes of condoms, each box having held a thousand condoms. Calculate how many rapes that represents."

Dr. Donna M. Hughes holds the Carlson Endowed Chair in Women's Studies at the University of Rhode Island.

See Also:

More About Sex Slavery in the United States

About Sex Slavery in Latin America