Criminal Profiling Topic of the Day: Why the Truth about Sex Rings is Important

This was just posted on my Facebook page:

"Pat Brown you ought to be ASHAMED of yourself for announcing on Nancy Grace's show that the people who run child sex rings do not "go around kidnapping people" and that they have "plenty of runaways" to choose from. SHAME ON YOU!!!!!! You know damn well this is FALSE and that thousands of men, women and children are KIDNAPPED and sold into sex slavery and the human trafficking industry every single year. You lost ALL credibility with me with that one comment."

This isn't the first time I have ticked someone off by stating that women and children are rarely, very rarely, ever kidnapped, if ever, into sex slavery rings in the United States. Whenever I speak on the subject, I get angry emails from women who believe I am ignoring a horrible crime against women and from mothers of missing daughters who believe their daughters were abducted into such a ring and are still alive.

But, the truth is, there is hardly any instance of this kind of crime in this country. Are there big sex rings? Yes, but they are made up of immigrant women who paid a lot of money for a US passport and then were forced into the sex trade; the passport is held from them until they can "earn" it back. Other than that, most prostitution in the United States is comprised of willing adults (at least they were willing when they entered the profession) and coerced teens and adults who were homeless, unemployed, and had drug or alcohol issues (some get into prostitution for the money and then get into drugs to deal with the life). Some children are lured by neighborhood pedophiles into sex acts through pornography, alcohol, and drugs (or terrorized into providing what the pedophile wants) and one pedophile or a group of pedophiles can have a "sex ring" of kids under their control. Sometimes a child is pimped out by his or her own parents, for money or for perverse pleasure.

What does NOT happen is that children and women are kidnapped off the streets and kept in captivity by some professional sex ring where they stay under lock and key for years. The few who are held captive for sex are in the hands of sex predators for their own personal use.

There is a reason parents of missing women want to believe there are sex rings out there; if their daughter were to be in one, she would still be alive. This gives hope to a grieving parent. Sex rings are a convenient black hole for children and adults to fall into and stay alive forever in the minds of their loved ones. Another reason for this belief is that some parents do not want to admit their daughters willingly chose to work in prostitution. They want to believe they were forced into it by brute force (and not through drugs or coercion). Rarely is this true.

One big myth is that of the desire for blonde girls is so big, that they must be kidnapped: Natalie Holloway and Madeleine McCann, for example. The truth of the matter is that blond girls can be enticed with money or promises of exotic locations and lifestyles. I remember I was in California and answered an ad that turned out to be for "hostesses" in Japan. When I realized it was really prostitution, I ran the other way. I am sure some blondes went, and, that could turn out to be a bad situation over there with clubs run by the Yakuza. Read the book, Some Girls; My Life in a Harem by Jillian Lauren, and one can see blonde girls are easier to hire, not steal. And remember Maddie McCann who is thought to be a stolen blonde child? And they thought they saw her in Morocco? Turned out to be a Moroccan blonde child, so if you wanted a blonde kid, there are lots of poor ones available that don't need to be abducted out of Portugal.

Why do I want people to know the truth? Because knowing our children are choosing to go into prostitution might help us focus on preventing them from doing so, saving their lives and keeping them from suffering years of degradation and misery. Also, parents need to be vigilant that their children aren't being targeted by local pedophiles and drawn into their world; parents need to parent and make sure their children don't hang around questionable relatives, youth "leaders, and neighbors. The truth can also focus a missing person investigation in the right direction. It is a shame to waste money on foolish avenues. Money needs to be spent properly in order to help the most victims of crime that we can.

I also get hate mail from people angry say when I state a missing person is likely dead and not in a sex ring, that I crush hope and discourage a search for the person. Are they right? Why would I come out and say this? Because the truth is important. One, all this pretending gives unreasonable false hope to people who often then spend a fortune on private investigators who will soak them for everything they have following false lead after false lead. Secondly, the focus should be on recovering the body so we can find the perpetrator and put him away before he abducts another child or adult and rapes and murders them as well.

The truth may not be as pleasing as an illusion, but it saves lives and keeps money and manpower from being wasted on wrongheaded thinking. We cannot make things better if we encourage a belief in myths just to make us or others feel better.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

Criminal Profiling Topic of the Day: Yes, Paige Birgfeld, Missing Mom, is a Hooker

Remember the Duke lacrosse team rape accuser? The exotic dancer who worked for an escort service to "pay her college tuition?" I called the woman a hooker when I was doing television interviews and I always got a shocked response. "Oh, no!" the host would exclaim! "She was a dancer!" Yeah, right. If a girl continues to work for an escort service after going out on a couple of "dates," she isn't keeping her job by refusing to provide the services her clients want.

When Virginia Tech killer Cho paid for a "dancer" to come to his hotel room, he was expecting to get sex. Everyone tiptoed around that as well. Do we in this society refuse to believe that prostitution exists in this country?

Paige Birgfeld, single mother of three, disappeared from Grand Junction, Colorado on June 23. Her abandoned car was found on fire across town. Soon after, her family and friends were surprised to find she had been leading a double life: not only did she sell kitchenware, make dishes for sick friends, and sew costumes for her children’s dance group, but she also worked as an escort. Her friends in the play group thought there might be something going on in her life they didn’t know about, but they never pried.

Someone has to say it. All this tiptoeing around the truth is about driving me nuts! Yes, Birgfeld had another line of income. She advertised her services as an “escort” named Carrie on her “Naughtynightlife” website which includes “extra” services that the police believe may have crossed legal boundries. May? Please. This single mother’s only other source of income is occasionally teaching dance to little children and selling Pampered Chef cookware at home parties, yet she lives in a house worth over a million dollars and doesn’t seem to be suffering from money problems.

Her site advertises in-call and out-call erotic massages which she offers in her office or at your home or hotel. She starts the massage dressed in a mini-skirt. She used to advertise her business as one offering acupuncture. She dressed in skimpy clothing and high heels for that procedure as well. All her clients were men and came (pun intended) after hours when the building was locked. The other tenants were suspicious she probably wasn’t doing medical procedures to relieve pain. I can’t imagine what could have tipped them off.

Birgfeld had worked as an exotic dancer before she met her second husband. When his finances went south during their marriage, Birgfeld told her hubby she was going back dancing to make money. Apparently, he found her dancing style a little disturbing when he found underwear in her car that wasn’t hers. This husband stated that he believed she was performing topless massages “at the least,” meaning her clients would getting a hand job while looking at her boobs.

Aw, come on, folks, let’s call a hooker a hooker. Yes, Paige Birgfeld is a hooker, a prostitute, a sex worker by any name you want to call her. She has sex with men for money and has done so for years. She may be a fun lady, a good friend, even a nice mommy (not a good mommy because clearly Birgfeld would not be working as a hooker if she were). There are other ways to make ends meet and I am sure her kids would have preferred she found another career while raising them.

It is important that we recognize Birgfeld is a hooker because it changes the profile of the victim and it lengthens the suspect list considerably. She has two ex-husbands and a boatload of scuzzy males who might have become angry with her. Birgfeld supposedly had been back dating her first husband. Did he not realize she was a pro? Might he not have gotten upset if he found that out? And what kind of guy would he be if he didn’t care? Her second ex-husband was supposedly upset that she was hooking while raising their children. I guess I can understand that emotion and he certainly could have a motive for wanting her out of his children's lives. Then, there are all her johns. One of them might be a serial killer or other kind of sex pervert.

Paige Birgfeld was making poor choices in her life. She put herself and her children’s lives in danger. She was a clearly a liar if her children, her parents, and her friends did not know the truth about her profession. She lied as well to at least one of her ex-husbands. Birgfeld was also lawbreaker which makes her a criminal. If the police found evidence of a violent crime in Birgfeld’s car, then she was likely murdered by one of the pissed off exes or one of her creepy tricks. If there is no sign of foul play, it is possible Birgfeld decided to take off and live a freer life as clearly she had a limited amount of concern for her children's well-being. Either way, the police can’t do their job and the public can’t bring them proper information if we are going to sugar-coat this woman’s life. If she was willing to put her picture up on a website called “Naughtynightlife” and spend time with strange men, why are we having such a problem labeling her a hooker? She is what she is and Mother Teresa she ain’t.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

Criminal Profiling Topic of the Day: A Hooker by any other Name....

I just love how we all pussyfoot around calling a hooker a hooker by renaming her an escort, a dancer, or a masseuse (and I am not talking about masseuses who have been trained to give more than a “Swedish fingertip massage”). I have always wondered whether the “dancer” the Duke boys asked over was supposed to provide a lot more than a musical distraction and why the university doesn’t have a problem with young men who represent their lacrosse team hiring prostitutes for their parties.

Now we have mass murderer Cho Seung-Hui hiring Chastity (yeah, right) Frye for $160 an hour to “dance” in his hotel room. She is yet another “escort” working for a service (read: upscale pimp) who says she didn’t provide sex for him but just did a lap dance. Chastity is a hooker and I have no problem making that statement publicly. If she had only worked for the “escort” service for one night, I could buy that she didn’t know that she was to provide sex for her client, but no girl who works in a massage parlor or for an escort service for more than that night will lose her job if she does not make her johns happy. Chastity admits she is an “escort” and does what “escorts” do, so we know she is a liar when she says she was dancing for Cho. Of course, she has to say that in order not to get arrested. Sadly, we have a massive number of prostitution services blatantly advertising on the Internet, in the newspaper, in the phone book and with big signs outside their buildings stating “Twenty-Four Hour Massage” and we do nothing about it. When was the last time you heard about those places being raided or closed down and why is it legal for our newspapers and yellow pages pimp for these places?

It used to be prostitution was relegated to a nasty red light district in our cities but now it has become part of everyday life. I guess when we as a society are as limited in morals as we are in today’s world, sex is just another commodity, even on college campuses.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

Criminal Profiling Topic of the Day: Prostitutes 'R Us

What a surprise! Craig’s List is in the prostitution business! Like the Internet and the The Yellow Pages, unless you are standing on the street corner, you have to advertise your business somewhere. Of course, there are those people who insist that adult web sites like AdultFriendFinder, massage parlors with untrained masseuses and water beds, photography services which allow a man to photograph naked girls alone in a booth, taxi dancing, go go clubs, and strip joints, and, of course, the escort services that the Duke University dancer came from, in no way permit females to exchange sex for money; they are all legitimate businesses that just provide girls for companionship and innocent amusement. Well, if you believe that, then you must believe that Anna Nicole Smith was a girl scout.

Sadly, on a more serious note, most communities really do ignore the many prostitution services out there and they are rarely shut down. Either we should make prostitution legal or we ought to do something about these blatant sex services that are proliferating in our towns and in cyberspace. We as a society should decide what we believe is legal or illegal and stand behind it. I would like to see massage parlors with masseuses who haven’t completed any accredited school required to give massages with a video camera taping them. The monitoring agency could then come by unannounced and view the tapes straight out of the machine. Want to see how fast massage parlors go out of business?

Of course, prostitutes don’t get much in the way of sentencing nor do the johns that use them, or the pimps that manage them, or the owners of the establishments that hire them. There is a tendency to think of these crimes as victimless, but this has never been true. Many of the women who get sucked into the life are only there because it exists as a means to make money, some of the johns get robbed or murdered, the wives of the johns get diseases, crime proliferates in the area, and the surrounding community suffers from the sliminess of it all. In some instances, children pay the price as they get pulled in as homeless teens to a life that will ultimately destroy them. No society benefits from prostitution; it is degrading and despicable. If you ask anyone if they would like to have prostitution on their street, the responses would be unquestionably in the negative. If this is the way we all feel, perhaps we ought to work on eradicating humankind's oldest profession instead of pretending it doesn't exist just because we can't see the girls in plain view on the corner.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown