They don't have specific numbers, but the FBI and the Anchorage Police Department say they're seeing more Native girls and women from Alaska villages being lured by pimps into prostitution in Anchorage. The Tundra Drums reports the information was shared this week with delegates to the Associated of Village Council presidents in Bethel.

From The Drums:

The sex-traffickers see young Native runaways as especially easy prey, said investigators. They're adrift in the big city, separated from a support network, and seeking money and attention.

Kathy Lacey, an investigator with the Anchorage Police Department, and Jolene Goeden, a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent, ... didn't give specific numbers but said they've seen a rising trend in roughly the past year or so.

The two came to Bethel to begin the process of educating rural residents about what's happening so parents can warn children. They want potential victims to be wary.

"When someone pulls up in a really nice Cadillac Escalade and they're promising them the world, we hope they're going to think twice before getting into that car," Goeden said.

The investigators said pimps frequent Anchorage teen hangouts including malls, the downtown bus depot and even the McLaughlin Youth Center detention facility.

The "sex-trafficking world is incredibly, incredibly violent. Once that grooming process is over it turns into, 'You owe me. I need you to do this for me one time. And then it happens over and over again,' " Goeden said.

Native girls are targeted in part because they're considered "versatile," meaning they can be advertised on the Internet as Hawaiian or Asian.

"It's all comes down to money," she said, with the pimps hauling in thousands of dollars a week.

The investigators said they will arrest underage prostitutes not to prosecute them but to get them away from pimps and into counseling and social services.

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