The Effect of Gang Organization on Coordinated Sex Trafficking

Author: Carpenter, Ami

Abstract: The contribution of this article is to examine gang-organized sex trafficking by placing human trafficking research in conversation with gang research. Human trafficking researchers have not systematically focused on gangs in the US, and gang researchers in the US have not studied sex trafficking connected to gangs. For both reasons, there is a significant lack of primary data on traffickers - especially those in gangs - and significant misperceptions about both have driven the predominant and ineffective policy of apprehension and prosecution. This study investigated the prevalence of organized (gang-directed) versus disorganized (entrepreneurial) activity reported by gangs involved in San Diego’s underground sex economy (UGSE). Regression analysis was used to examine whether organized gangs were more likely than disorganized gangs to direct coordinated sex trafficking operations. The study finds a significant, positive association between gang organization and gang-directed sex trafficking, but it also finds that the majority of sex trafficking in San Diego is disorganized. Accordingly, we argue for a reorientation of current efforts under the United States’ federal policy framework (commonly referred to as the 4-P Framework) away from Prosecution, and toward Prevention - comprehensive, multi-agency approaches which have been shown to have the greatest impact on reducing violent crime. Since Prevention has been underutilized in the United States, our final contribution is to explore why Prevention has received less attention than Prosecution and Protection, and explore the principles and paradigms on which a preventive approach to gang-involved sex trafficking can be based.

Keywords: gang, gang complexity, gang organization, human trafficking, organized crime, sex trafficking