Hamilton girls rescued from sex trade; two adults arrested

BRANTFORD — Two Hamilton girls forced into the sex trade have been rescued in Brantford.

The girls, aged 14 and 16, were freed from their controllers Monday after community patrol officers spoke with them at a motel on Colborne Street, Brantford police said in a news release Tuesday.

A police investigation found the two were being recruited and controlled to provide sexual services.

The two adult suspects charged with human trafficking had allegedly advertised sexual services to be performed by the girls. When cash was received in exchange for the sex, the suspects took the money, police said.

Deja Denique Clarke, 18, of Brantford and Same Tedros Alemu, 20, of Toronto, face several charges. Both are charged with human trafficking under 18, receiving a material benefit, deriving a material benefit, procuring sexual services from a person under 18 and advertising sexual services.

Clarke faces an additional charge of profiting from the proceeds of crime. Alemu is also charged with three counts of disobeying a court order.

The situation had Brantford police issuing statements on how to recognize the signs of someone trying to lure young girls and boys into the sex trade and its exploitation.

Const. Natalie Laing, media and recruiting officer, called human trafficking a modern form of slavery and said the victims are mostly young women.

“A lot of times, it starts with unsolicited comments on the young person’s media account, or on Instagram, from people they don’t know.”

Sometimes it’ll be a comment such as “you’re beautiful” to start luring them in through chatting, she said.

“It starts off as a relationship. They (the perpetrators) try to develop a rapport quickly because they want to find out a lot about them.”

The traffickers are looking for situations they can exploit to their advantage. That could be a youth’s low self-esteem, a rocky relationship with parents, trouble at school or run-ins with bullies.

“It’s socially acceptable for youth to invite people to follow them who are strangers. That’s how it starts,” Laing said.

If the young person is complaining about how their parents don’t understand them, don’t treat them as mature or with respect, the perpetrator steps in to give them what they want to hear.

That “brings them into a fantasy world” of someone who loves them, who understands them and makes them all kinds of wonderful promises, Laing said.

It becomes a relationship, but soon the perpetrator will tell the victim he’s having a little financial trouble and suggests they can make a little money through sex, but it will stop once they have some money, she adds.

Except it doesn’t stop and the relationship changes into one of total control by the trafficker, who then threatens to tell everyone “you have prostituted yourself,” Laing said.

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It’s socially acceptable for youth to invite people to follow them who are strangers. That’s how it starts. CONST. NATALIE LAING

Brantford Police Service