Teens who thought they were getting modeling jobs were instead sold into the sex trade. Now, a Jacksonville man is going to prison.
One man lured the girls and another used photo sessions to get them to strip or have sex on video. Now, the two men are in federal prison for using underage models to produce pornography.
Agents found images and videos of at least two minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct during a search of 49-year-old Thomas Leslie Carr's Jacksonville home, federal investigators said.
According to court documents, law enforcement officers began a human trafficking investigation involving the prostitution of minor and adult females throughout Florida in 2012.
Investigators said Michael Gallon, of Lakeland, recruited women to travel and work as "models" at “parties” and “VIP rooms” where customers paid to have sex with them.
It’s a method Action News Jax crime and safety expert and former Jacksonville Sheriff's Office Crime and Sex Detective Ken Jefferson says is used often.
“These are young ladies who are lured through the internet, through ads, through word of mouth, and sometimes they go looking out for these young ladies,” Jefferson said.
Jefferson says that’s why JSO is doing everything it can to fight the growing problem.
“This sort of thing is monitored on a regular basis. They dedicate certain detectives and their organizations that are helping out with the monitoring,” Jefferson said.
Kristen Keen is with an organization called Rethreaded, which helps survivors escape the sex trade. Human trafficking is a $32 billion a year industry and a form of modern-day slavery, that usually targets women. The victims are often vulnerable, between 75 percent and 95 percent of prostituted women were sexually abused as children.
“It’s never OK to buy a human being. I think one of the biggest things we can do is change the culture and demand. I think it would help us, if we had stronger punishments for buying sex, and we just said no,” Keen said.
Carr will be sentenced in September. He’s facing 15 to 30 years in prison.
Cox Media Group
