Providing treatment for women arrested in prostitution stings is a better approach
If there’s a “victimless’’ crime, it isn’t prostitution. Prostitutes are in constant danger of being beaten or worse, and in turn, some rob the men who try to pick them up. Open prostitution in a neighborhood or business district can create a climate that invites other crime.
Those are all legitimate reasons for the Washtenaw County Sheriff’s Office and Ypsilanti police to team up for a series of prostitution stings over the past year along a stretch of East Michigan Avenue.
But this isn’t the kind of routine operation that all too often simply shifts the problem somewhere else while the women being arrested cycle through a revolving door of justice and end up right back on the street.
This intersection along Michigan Avenue was the site of an arrest during a prostitution sting in late August.
Melanie Maxwell | AnnArbor.com
Prostitution has been a serious problem along East Michigan Avenue in both the city of Ypsilanti and Ypsilanti Township. For a while, police in Ypsilanti had been operating stings in the city, while sheriff’s deputies who patrol the township did their own enforcement there.
What they concluded was that their separate operations were just pushing the problem up and down the avenue. So over the past year, they’ve decided to take a more coordinated approach. This partnership makes sense, but beyond that, they’ve also incorporated an aggressive social program that assesses the substance abuse or and mental health issues of the prostitutes being arrested and steers them toward treatment.
These services are provided through Washtenaw County’s Project Outreach Team, or PORT, which was created to provide mental health services to the homeless and to those who end up in the criminal justice system. Outreach workers say that women who end up in prostitution almost always have mental health issues or a drug addiction that they are looking to feed. Most often, these women are high on drugs when arrested.
Last month, Perkins rode along with authorities while they conducted a sting during which seven women were arrested. He wrote about how each woman, before being taken to jail, was evaluated by an outreach worker, who also made follow-up visits while the woman is in jail. Meanwhile, a bed in a treatment center is held open for the woman, who is either steered -- or ordered by the court -- to seek treatment.
Officials don’t have any hard data yet on how the program is working, but they are encouraged by what they’ve seen so far. Police find they are arresting fewer repeat offenders than they have in past stings. And some of the women arrested early in the program are now working as volunteers at PORT.
While authorities would like to eliminate the problem of prostitution along the Michigan Avenue corridor, it would take a variety of approaches to accomplish that. One important step forward came with the shutting down and clearing of the Ypsilanti Mobile Village mobile home park, which had a reputation of contributing to prostitution because of the high number of abandoned homes there.
Greater cooperation between city police and sheriff’s deputies is an important ingredient, too. But despite their joint efforts, if arrests only get women off the street for the brief amount of time it takes them to appear before a judge and be released, the problem just perpetuates itself. Treating these women for the underlying problems they are struggling with is a more humane and meaningful approach. We look forward to seeing what kind of results come from this innovative approach, and hope other agencies will consider it if it proves effective over time.
Comments
Basic Bob
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 10:31 p.m.
If the goal is crime reduction, addressing the underlying problems is the key. It seems clear that that most women who engage in prostitution have drug habits to support. Drug addiction both increases the need for money and the willingness to have sex with strangers. Arresting these individuals should encourage them to seek treatment, but then these treatment programs need to be available. Ypsilanti and the sheriff seem to be on the right track. But it seems quite ironic to me that law enforcement officers would engage in crime reduction. If it actually works, doesn't that threaten their livelihood? In Pittsfield they *doubled* the public service millage, so they can beef up law enforcement by putting more cops and more deadly force on the street. Do they also attempt to prevent crime? Or do they just try to scare them into moving on to Ypsi, where they take a more holistic and humane approach to the crime problem?
donderop
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 8:08 p.m.
Prostitution and marijuana sting operations are a waste of money and time. For every prostitute and pot dealer you arrest, several more waiting to take their place. These trades have always been there, always will be. The more you force them into alleys and abandoned houses, the more danger you put everybody -- including the general public -- into. Why wait until someone's busted for hooking before they can get treatment? All addicts should have access to health care, as should prostitutes -- as should EVERYONE. America's legal system contributes to the creation and proliferation of crime.
snoopdog
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 6:30 p.m.
There is not a single reason that prostitution should not be legalized. The only losers would be the pimps ! Good Day
just a voice
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 3:01 p.m.
Why isn't the Project Outreach Team POT, rather then PORT?
Terrin Bell
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 2:38 p.m.
It should be legal like it is in other Countries like Canada. Legalization decreases crime and helps with public safety in the way of better monitoring of sexual transmitted diseases. In places like Canada, prostitutes are required to have a license and undergo sexual transmitted disease testing. It is a victimless crime when both parties are willing. Making it be illegal under such circumstances seems silly and is just a way of inserting peoples moral on others.
ChunkyPastaSauce
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 2 p.m.
"authorities are approaching this enforcement in a way that provides women with treatment for the underlying issues that led them into prostitution in the first place." I think this should be done for anyone who has been arrested for a crime (as long as it is optional since they have not been convicted as of yet).
Bogie
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 1:44 p.m.
It scares me to see the up and coming group of "just legalize it." I don't believe prostitution is a preferred way to make a living. There is other problem (addictions or economics) that most likely make woman do this type of work. How about addressing those problems? How about working on getting these women off drugs or get them a job? Why is it, that we are now a bunch of "cop outs." I believe it's just another example of the laziness of our society.
Not from around here
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 6:19 p.m.
No Johnny, because the majority of Americans, and there elected officals, believe it is not a preffered method of making a living it is ban. Contrairy to a select group of the citizens of ann arbor, there beliefs and status do not make their opinion law. I have lived arround areas with high prostitution levels, including an country where it was legal, and the number of Pimps, driug dealers adn violent criminals that waited to take advatage of the Prostituites and there clients was amazing. If you want your opinion to become law, put together a refferendum, call you congress man and see where it goes.
Lola
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 3:58 p.m.
Well said , Johnnya2.
johnnya2
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 2:27 p.m.
So because YOU don't believe it is a preferred way to make a living, we should ban it? I would have no desire to clean windows on a 70 story high rise. It would not be my preferred way to make a living. BUT if I were unemployed and needed money to pay my mortgage or put food on the table, you bet your butt I will be on that scaffolding. EVERY person in the world prostitutes themselves when they go to work. They sell their time or expertise or talent in exchange for money. If you have the time, talent or expertise to be good at sex, why shouldn't you get paid for it? Nobody is forcing YOU to participate. Why is it your business how a prostitute makes her money? The prostitute and her customer are the only two people that matter in the transaction. Where prostitution is legal, there is little crime affiliated with it in those areas. The way it is in Ypsi Twp, breeds crime. This also goes for the prohibition on drugs as well. Of course if you put the name Pfizer on a deadly drug it makes it legal, but a non-lethal drug like pot is a crime.
pbehjatnia
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 1:57 p.m.
If prostitution is made legal then it will be much easier to control and provide outreach to men and women working as prostitutes. It will be much more effective to police and track e.g., disease or inappropriate johns. The underlying issues cannot be addressed unless the overall picture is under control. And the economic, social and emotional issues which lead people to sell their bodies are unreachable without some structure and control. Prostitution is legal in so many places. Does it go away? No. As long we have sex prostitution will be here. But many of the most unsavory aspects of this business can be eliminated or curbed effectively.
johnnya2
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 12:48 p.m.
" Prostitutes are in constant danger of being beaten or worse, and in turn, some rob the men who try to pick them up" If prostitution were legal they would not be in danger and there would be less chance of being robbed since either party would be involved in a LEGAL transaction. Yes. people may still get beaten or robbed, but that is a danger in any business. There have been bank robberies in the area the last few months. The difference is in this situation there is no legal recourse for either party in prostitution. If you really want to see the stupidity of the law, look at these facts. If you hire a girl to have sex, and you film it, it is porn and legal to produce.. If you do not film it, it is called prostitution and not legal. More stupidity. If you have sex with a 16 year old in the state of Michigan it is legal, BUT if you view images of a naked 16 year old on your computer, you are committing a felony.
Craig Lounsbury
Sun, Sep 11, 2011 : 12:55 p.m.
"If you hire a girl to have sex, and you film it, it is porn and legal to produce..If you do not film it, it is called prostitution and not legal." an interesting irony I had never heard before.