Missouri Attorney General’s Office plans trafficking crackdown
Two men were charged in federal court Friday, accused of running a brothel in Columbia and advertising prostitutes online.
Barry Manthe and Ronald Clark were booked Thursday night at the scene of the alleged crimes: 1125 Vandiver Drive.
They are the second and third arrests in this case. Kenneth Jones was arrested earlier this month and accused of sex trafficking crimes, including forcing a minor to work as a prostitute.
The federal court documents outline the series of crimes, but the use of online classified ads at backpage.com is one of the specifics that got the feds involved.
That crime is “use of interstate commerce in aid of racketeering enterprise” or the use of the internet for prostitution.
Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley told ABC 17 News prostitution and human trafficking are bigger problems than many people realize.
“This is not a crime that happens elsewhere. It is a crime that happens right here in our own neighborhoods as we have seen from today’s news,” said Hawley. “It is happening all over our state and we’ve got to take new action to prevent it.”
The attorney general said that’s why he will be making a major announcement Monday.
“It’s incidents just like the one you’re reporting about in the Columbia area today,” said Hawley. “We are seeing an increase in the reports of young women and girls, and I say that advisedly, Joey, because of the 4 1/2 million people who are trapped in the commercial sex industry, exploited in that, 98 percent of them are women.
So, of the young women and girls across this state who are being coerced or tricked or defrauded into this exploitation we are seeing it’s difficult for law enforcement to prove these cases. It’s difficult to bring them to trial using traditional criminal law.”
Friday night, Hawley gave ABC 17 News a preview of what will be unveiled next week.
“We’re going to form a new unit in the AG’s Office dedicated to fighting trafficking,” said Hawley. “We’re going to form a statewide task force and we have some creative new uses of Missouri law that we think will allow us to go after traffickers in a new way.”
ABC 17 News will be monitoring the Attorney General’s news conference Monday morning as the new anti-trafficking unit is announced.
