On June 19, 2024, the Reading police arrested three women in an undercover “prostitution detail” in downtown Reading. The women’s ages range from 27 to 40, and all are from Berks County or a surrounding county. Each woman was separately charged with criminal solicitation to promote prostitution/loiter for purposes of prostitution. One of the women was also charged with use/possession of drug paraphernalia.
According to the arrest reports, undercover male officers assigned to the Vice Unit posed as sex buyers and drove around the downtown area in unmarked cars. When a woman entered an unmarked vehicle and agreed upon a price for a specific sex act with an undercover officer, officers in another car performed a stop on the unmarked vehicle to arrest the woman.
Bail was set at $5,000 secured for two women, and $1,000 for the third. No bail was posted in any of the cases, and all women were remanded to Berks County Prison to await their preliminary hearings, all scheduled for July 5, 2024.
The CSE Institute is disappointed in the decision to charge and prosecute these women. We encourage the Reading Police Department and Berks County to look further into the nuances of situations such as these; if the woman is being exploited, her “choice” to engage in the conduct is no choice at all, and she should not be criminalized for her exploitation or crimes resulting from her exploitation.
Indeed, the arrest records of the women charged in this prostitution sting point to a pattern of exploitation, re-victimization, and criminalization. One of the women has no permanent address and a record reflecting criminal trespass, retail theft, disorderly conduct, and receiving stolen property. Another has prostitution charges spanning her 20-year record; her first Pennsylvania prostitution arrest dates back to 2003. Since then, she has been charged with prostitution multiple other times, possession of drug paraphernalia, false identification to law enforcement officers, disorderly conduct, and retail theft. Lastly, the woman who is charged with criminal solicitation to promote prostitution as well as use/possession of drug paraphernalia was arrested just 10 days earlier for criminal solicitation to promote prostitution. Bail in that case was set at $10,000 unsecured, and her preliminary hearing, originally scheduled for June 21, was continued to July 5 along with her new charges. Apart from that, her record, too, is replete with false identification, retail theft, and drug possession charges.
We highlight the records of these women not to characterize them as criminals, but instead to demonstrate how these women have been re-victimized and criminalized by the system while they are vulnerable and exploited. Nearly all of the charges on the women’s records are masking charges for prostitution.
Many victims of human trafficking end up in situations where they are forced or compelled to commit other criminal acts as a result of their exploitation. In a 2016 survey of 130 survivors conducted by the National Survivor Network, more than 50% of trafficking survivors surveyed reported that every arrest on their record was trafficking-related.
However, arresting a victim for prostitution or another masking crime has little impact when sexual exploitation, trauma, addiction, and other vulnerabilities dominate her life. Victims need exit pathways, treatment, and support— not jail time.
In fact, the practice of prosecuting people who are bought and sold for sex perpetuates the harmful ideology that people in prostitution are criminals rather than people who are exploited. It increases the traumatization and stigmatization of this population and creates even more barriers for victims attempting to exit “the life.” A single criminal conviction can serve as a massive obstacle to stable employment, housing opportunities, and much more.
Instead, the CSE Institute encourages law enforcement to hold sex buyers accountable for the exploitation they perpetuate. Charging people with prostitution does nothing to eradicate the sex trade. It is the traffickers and buyers who perpetuate sexual exploitation and keep the commercial sex trade alive. The CSE Institute advocates for the Equality Model to combat commercial sexual exploitation. The Equality Model seeks to reduce the demand for commercial sex by criminalizing sex buyers and traffickers and decriminalizing prostituted people. The four pillars of the Equality Model are: (1) decriminalization of the person who is selling sex, (2) criminalization of sex buyers and facilitators, (3) educating the public about the harms of prostitution, and (4) funded, holistic exit services for victims of commercial sexual exploitation.
Combatting human trafficking requires an effort to identify and support victims, not arrest and prosecute those who are bought and sold for sex. We hope that law enforcement and district attorney’s offices will use their power to do justice for victims, rather than perpetuate their criminalization. The CSE Institute will continue to provide updates as this matter unfolds.
All views expressed herein are personal to the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law or Villanova University.