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Jupiter, FL police chief confirms NE Patriots owner Robert Kraft charged in prostitution ring bust


Jason

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31 minutes ago, CitizenVectron said:

 

If there were brothels and house-visit escorts that were federally licensed and regulated and were cheaper than the black market, then yes it would. People said the same thing about the black market for marijuana in Colorado and how it would survive...and it's lost almost everything to the legal market since prices are cheaper and it's legal and convenient.

 

You can’t undercut the price of slave labor in a service industry. That’s the point.

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1 hour ago, CitizenVectron said:

 

If there were brothels and house-visit escorts that were federally licensed and regulated and were cheaper than the black market, then yes it would. People said the same thing about the black market for marijuana in Colorado and how it would survive...and it's lost almost everything to the legal market since prices are cheaper and it's legal and convenient.

 

No. The analogy doesn't work. In the marijuana industry, the marijuana plants don't get a choice about whether they participate. 

 

If you remove trafficking, exploitation, and coercion (and especially if I'm including the coercion inherent within a capitalist economy here -- IE: you have to work at SOMETHING or you'll fucking starve) there are very, very few women who are willing to engage in sex trade work.  If you run a brothel, even if prostitution were legalized, the majority of women working for you would be either trafficked, coerced, or women who have no other choice due to some combination of: drug addictions, mental health and lack of education.

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16 minutes ago, SilentWorld said:

 

No. The analogy doesn't work. In the marijuana industry, the marijuana plants don't get a choice about whether they participate. 

 

If you remove trafficking, exploitation, and coercion (and especially if I'm including the coercion inherent within a capitalist economy here -- IE: you have to work at SOMETHING or you'll fucking starve) there are very, very few women who are willing to engage in sex trade work.  If you run a brothel, even if prostitution were legalized, the majority of women working for you would be either trafficked, coerced, or women who have no other choice due to some combination of: drug addictions, mental health and lack of education.

 

I agree with you that the situations are not the exact same, and that the underlying market forces are different. However, even with "free" labour, there are still costs involved that set a bottom price point, especially given the risks involved in a criminal operation. That also doesn't take into the account that once it is legal, it is easier (politically) for police forces to then bust the illegal operations and seize assets/charge owners, driving the risk/cost up even further.

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Just now, CitizenVectron said:

 

I agree with you that the situations are not the exact same, and that the underlying market forces are different. However, even with "free" labour, there are still costs involved that set a bottom price point, especially given the risks involved in a criminal operation. That also doesn't take into the account that once it is legal, it is easier (politically) for police forces to then bust the illegal operations and seize assets/charge owners, driving the risk/cost up even further.

 

Plus, there would be market demand for the legal, non-shitty option. 

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3 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

Plus, there would be market demand for the legal, non-shitty option. 

 

Definitely. The existing black market would certainly exist, but even if legal prices were higher, if the quality and quality-assurance was there (better situation, guilt-free, etc), then you'd likely see a huge portion of customers switch to them.

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3 minutes ago, CitizenVectron said:

 

Definitely. The existing black market would certainly exist, but even if legal prices were higher, if the quality and quality-assurance was there (better situation, guilt-free, etc), then you'd likely see a huge portion of customers switch to them.

 

An assurance of staying out of legal trouble would be a huge draw in and of itself. 

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32 minutes ago, SilentWorld said:

 

No. The analogy doesn't work. In the marijuana industry, the marijuana plants don't get a choice about whether they participate. 

 

If you remove trafficking, exploitation, and coercion (and especially if I'm including the coercion inherent within a capitalist economy here -- IE: you have to work at SOMETHING or you'll fucking starve) there are very, very few women who are willing to engage in sex trade work.  If you run a brothel, even if prostitution were legalized, the majority of women working for you would be either trafficked, coerced, or women who have no other choice due to some combination of: drug addictions, mental health and lack of education.

 

I would encourage you to put forth that argument with actual sex workers, because many of them would not endorse it. The fact most women do not choose to be sex workers does not mean most sex workers did not choose it.

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1 hour ago, CitizenVectron said:

 

Definitely. The existing black market would certainly exist, but even if legal prices were higher, if the quality and quality-assurance was there (better situation, guilt-free, etc), then you'd likely see a huge portion of customers switch to them.

I'm not saying the black market would be the problem. I'm saying that the newly legitimized and legal sex trade businesses would not be free from exploitation, coercion or trafficking. 

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Sex slavery is only one way in which people are trafficked. The majority of human trafficking jobs in western countries are completely legal work. The whole point of trafficking is the exploitation of vulnerable people for profit. People get trafficked to work legal agriculture jobs, or in construction, or as nannies, or to literally beg on the corner. The types of victims in these places aren’t going to be freed by legalization.

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Just now, sblfilms said:

Sex slavery is only one way in which people are trafficked. The majority of human trafficking jobs in western countries are completely legal work. The whole point of trafficking is the exploitation of vulnerable people for profit. People get trafficked to work legal agriculture jobs, or in construction, or as nannies, or to literally beg on the corner. The types of victims in these places aren’t going to be freed by legalization.

 

Bringing it into the light and allowing actual regulatory attempts at verifying that everything is on the up-and-up is always going to be better in this regard than attempting to just lock up everyone involved.

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32 minutes ago, Ghost_MH said:

It does seem like there should be a human trafficking charge if there was indeed human trafficking involved here. It's not like the punishments for prostitution and trafficking are anywhere in the same ballpark.

 

This also reminds me how gross sting operations to catch prostitutes are. 

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43 minutes ago, sblfilms said:

What story about negative aspects of a particular industry is complete without somebody from the industry claiming the problem is overblown?

 

You are correct, only in this case nobody has been arrested on human trafficking charges. Maybe they're still to come? Also, if this was a months long sting, that really does suck. Police watched a place they believed women were being held captive and paid the women they believe were victims for massages? They even set up video to catch these women being forced to perform acts against their will and did nothing about it for months? That's all just gross.

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3 minutes ago, Ghost_MH said:

 

You are correct, only in this case nobody has been arrested on human trafficking charges. Maybe they're still to come? Also, if this was a months long sting, that really does suck. Police watched a place they believed women were being held captive and paid the women they believe were victims for massages? They even set up video to catch these women being forced to perform acts against their will and did nothing about it for months? That's all just gross.

 

Yeah something about this doesn't sound right. I have female cop friends who have participated in prostitution stings... they don't perform the act THEN arrest the dude. Did police actually video Kraft and others getting... service THEN arrest him? That's kinda crazy if they allowed actual prostitution to continue while they were "investigating". Also if these women were being trafficked, why didn't they just bust them and shut down the operation as SOON as they saw sex acts were being forced on them? This story is all kinds of fucked up.

 

23 minutes ago, elbobo said:

so who were the bigger names than Kraft? 

 

Yeah who?

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36 minutes ago, Ghost_MH said:

 

You are correct, only in this case nobody has been arrested on human trafficking charges. Maybe they're still to come? Also, if this was a months long sting, that really does suck. Police watched a place they believed women were being held captive and paid the women they believe were victims for massages? They even set up video to catch these women being forced to perform acts against their will and did nothing about it for months? That's all just gross.

 

Trafficking is difficult to prove without a complaining witness. It is like domestic violence charges when a spouse refuses to testify against the perpetrator.

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20 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

 

Yeah something about this doesn't sound right. I have female cop friends who have participated in prostitution stings... they don't perform the act THEN arrest the dude. Did police actually video Kraft and others getting... service THEN arrest him? That's kinda crazy if they allowed actual prostitution to continue while they were "investigating". Also if these women were being trafficked, why didn't they just bust them and shut down the operation as SOON as they saw sex acts were being forced on them? This story is all kinds of fucked up.

 

The police are claiming to have worked this case for months and have video evidence on multiple men having sex in this spa. So to answer your question, yes; they watched men have sex in this spa they suspected was holding women against their will and forced into prostitution for months on hidden cameras the women were not aware of.

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27 minutes ago, Ghost_MH said:

 

The police are claiming to have worked this case for months and have video evidence on multiple men having sex in this spa. So to answer your question, yes; they watched men have sex in this spa they suspected was holding women against their will and forced into prostitution for months on hidden cameras the women were not aware of.

 

I'm sure all of that video evidence was handled in a professional and responsible way :| 

 

EDIT: He's going to sue the fuck out of them.

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