Investigators arrested 14 people and rescued 10 victims including a 16-year-old during an undercover human trafficking sting at Comic-Con International.
The comic book and pop culture convention brings more than 100,000 people to the San Diego Convention Center each year, and this year, human trafficking detectives carried out a human trafficking investigation there from July 25 to 28, according to California Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office.Â
The San Diego Human Trafficking Task Force, which includes federal, state and county-level detectives, went to Comic-Con to find victims of sex trafficking and “sex buyers using the San Diego Comic-Con Convention to seek out potential victims,” according to a statement from Bonta’s office.
“Unfortunately, sex traffickers capitalize on large scale events such as Comic-Con to exploit their victims for profit,” Bonta said in the statement.
The state justice department said law enforcement officials went to the convention undercover, pretending to be “sex buyers” as they searched for suspects and potential victims. The investigators also posted undercover advertisements soliciting sex in order to find suspects, authorities said.
Advocates of human trafficking victims and other support services were provided to those rescued in the three-day operation, including child welfare services for the teenager.
“There is no more insidious crime than human trafficking,” San Diego Sheriff Kelly Martinez said in the statement from Bonta’s office.
“The coercion and violence which enslaves people for profit and places them into forced labor or sex is criminal,” she said. “I appreciate the focus that was placed on the recent convention to identify and rescue victims of human trafficking.”
During the pandemic, the annual massive event had to go virtual before returning to its usual site at the San Diego Convention Center more recently, once again drawing thousands of people to the city.
