‘I can’t get my sister back:’ Investigators warn of sex traffickers targeting Natives

By KYLE HOPKINS for The Village

A disproportionate number of women working in the Anchorage sex trade are Alaska Native and pimps and sex traffickers are pursuing Native girls at events like AFN, police warned tribes and villagers today.

“There have been traffickers and pimps who specifically target Native girls because they feel that they’re versatile and they can post them (online) as Hawaiian, as Native, as Asian, as you name it,” said Jolene Goeden, a special agent for the FBI in Anchorage.

Far from home and surrounded by strangers, girls from remote villages are particularly vulnerable to sex-trade recruiters said Goeden and Sgt. Kathy Lacey, supervisor for the Anchorage police vice unit. The investigators delivered a kind of “Prostitution 101” to people from villages across the state at an annual Bureau of Indian Affairs conference, telling community leaders and health workers to be on the lookout for pimps preying on Alaska Native women and girls.

The pair gave a a similar, shorter talk in October in Bethel. For some, the stories were personal.

“We don’t think that this is happening in our in small villages. It happens. It happened to my baby sister,” said a woman from a rural hub city, who said her sister was 14 years old when she disappeared while visiting the Alaska Federation of Natives convention in Anchorage about four years ago.

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Native American women experience domestic violence and sexual assault at more than double the rate of other racial groups in the United States. An Amnesty International report in 2007 estimated that Native American women are 2.5 times as likely to experience sexual assault in their lifetime.

Despite this reality, there is a dearth of services for Native American women who experience sexual assault or domestic violence, particularly culturally competent services. Similarly, there are very few services for Native American women and girls who are victims of sex trafficking.

In 2009, the Minnesota Indian Women's Resource Center released a report on "The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of American Indian Women and Girls in Minnesota," which is one of the best sources of information and data on sex trafficking of Native Americans.

Alaskan Bill Had Raised Concerns About Effects on Trafficking Victims

From Fairbanks Daily News-Miner: JUNEAU — The state House rejected a bill Monday that aimed to let Alaska tailor drivers’ licenses for visa holders and other international visitors to last only as long as they can legally stay in the United States. State regulations require state-issued driver licenses to be valid for five years, regardless of whether a holder’s immigration papers expire sooner than that, state Division of Motor Vehicles director Whitney Brewster said.

The bill, introduced more than a year ago, had been quiet for almost a year. It drew plenty of attention Monday, with supporters saying it would appropriately help ensure illegal aliens can’t hold a state driver’s license. Opponents said it would saddle Alaska with the responsibility of helping oversee immigration laws and worried it could could complicate the license application process for victims of human sex trafficking. The House rejected the bill 23-17 but sponsor Rep. Bob Lynn, R-Anchorage, said he’d seek another vote under legislative reconsideration rules. Six other Republicans co-sponsored the bill, including Fairbanks Rep. Jay Ramras.

It bounced through the House committee process last winter, drawing questions along the way, before falling dormant. But Brewster followed revived debate last week by writing to Lynn Thursday explicitly supporting the bill. Brewster said the bill would let the state issue drivers licenses that expire when the holder’s legal stay in the United States expires. He said the bill is not about immigration: It would leave the Division of Motor Vehicles simply checking drivers’ qualifications and legal documents. The bill would change nothing for license holders who need to renew their licenses every five years, he said. “Immigration is a problem but it’s a federal problem and we need to keep it that way,” he said. He said Alaska is one of four states that lack such a measure.

Opponents said the plan could be a back door to compliance with part of the 5-year-old federal REAL ID Act. Some also said the change would make it difficult for victims of human trafficking to gain licenses. It was unclear from the debate Monday how the bill would affect that population, which Rep. Anna Fairclough, R-Eagle River and one of a handful of Republicans to vote against the bill, estimated at roughly 200 in Alaska. A clause in the bill would have let the division issue licenses to a sex or human trafficking victim while he or she applied for permanent or conditional resident status. Fairclough and Rep. Beth Kerttula, D-Juneau, said they remained unconvinced the bill would protect that population. Rep. Tammie Wilson, R-North Pole, called the bill “well-intentioned” but opposed what she said would saddle state workers with a responsibility — overseeing citizenship — appropriately left to the federal government.

Various clauses in the bill explicitly forbid the state from issuing identification cards “solely to bring the state into compliance” with the 2005 REAL ID Act, which sought to homogenize the process used to issue state-level drivers licenses across the country. One line reads that the bill “may not be construed as support for, or compliance with, the federal REAL ID Act.” The Legislature has also passed other bills in recent years barring the state from taking similar steps from complying with the federal law. The bill is House Bill 3.

This is a really interesting news piece, and I am pleasantly surprised to see that consideration for the way this bill would have affected victims of human trafficking by its passage was given as much weight as it received. A lot of the issues that are debated concerning immigration affect victims of human trafficking, particularly those who are undocumented. Most people don't realize the amount of time it takes for non-governmental organizations, legal service providers and law enforcement agencies to assist survivors in adjusting their immigration status if they are undocumented - it could take many months or even years before they have the documentation to be able to become more self-sufficient while they are restarting their life outside of their trafficking situation. That time in limbo can be extremely difficult and frustrating for the survivor to deal with, and this is in part due to the kind of restrictions that are placed on them by their lack of status. I hope other legislators give survivors this kind of consideration in similar bills.

Alaska Man Sentenced to 30 Years in Prison on Sex Trafficking and Drug Charges

From Market Watch:

August 15, 2008

An Alaska man was sentenced today to 30 years in prison for sex trafficking of minors and adults, as well as drug trafficking offenses, Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich of the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Nelson P. Cohen of the District of Alaska announced.

Don Arthur Webster Jr., 51, also known as "Jerry Starr," was sentenced by Senior U.S. District Court Judge H. Russel Holland. In addition to his prison sentence, Webster was ordered to serve a lifetime of supervised release following his release from prison.

Webster was convicted on Feb. 5, 2008, of 28 counts in the first sex trafficking trial in the District of Alaska. After 11 days of testimony, the jury found Webster guilty on two counts of sex trafficking of a minor; nine counts of sex trafficking of adults by force, fraud or coercion; two counts of distributing crack cocaine to a pregnant woman; four counts of distributing crack cocaine to individuals under the age of 21; and eight counts of distributing crack cocaine. Webster was also convicted of one count of maintaining a premises for the purpose of manufacturing and distributing crack cocaine, and one count of manufacturing crack cocaine.

"This defendant preyed on the most vulnerable among us to make a fast buck. Using fear, violence and intimidation, he forced women and children into the tragic world of prostitution and drugs," said Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich. "The prison sentence handed down today denies Webster the freedom he denied his victims, and those who commit similar crimes should expect to be prosecuted."

"Evil takes many forms. Don Webster, a/k/a Jerry Starr, embodies several of them," said U.S. Attorney Nelson P. Cohen. "He is a drug pusher - who used both cocaine and crack to enslave his victims. He is a disgusting bully who manipulated women and children. He is a physical abuser who forced his will upon weaker people with threats of burning them with boiling water; confining them to a closet; beating and raping them; and even choking a woman to the point of unconsciousness in the presence of two other women and a child. He is a thief who stole their dignity and hope. He is a violent predator who deserves the sentence imposed today. There are people in our world who need to be locked up and put away for a long time. Jerry Starr is one of them."

The case against Webster revealed that he operated sham escort businesses that were fronts for prostitution in the Anchorage area of Alaska. The evidence presented at trial established that Webster would target children and women who were homeless, in low-paying jobs or runaways, and invite them to work for his purported "escort services" - Foxy Roxies, Sunshine Girls, American Beauties, Kotton Kandy, Tiffani's, Tickle Your Fancy and Lickety Split - businesses where an individual would supposedly pay for another person's "time and company."

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