By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
Two Homeland Security agents investigating a transnational network of illegal massage parlors engaged in sex acts with the alleged victims in two Arizona cities, according to reports uncovered by Today’s News-Herald.
The reports indicate two agents participated in sex acts at massage parlors at least 10 times with Asian immigrants who were forced into sex slavery.
The two-year trafficking investigation began in 2016, when police were tipped off about several massage parlors in Lake Havasu City and Bullhead City in Arizona. When local police departments found evidence that some of the employees may have been victims of human trafficking, they called in the Department of Homeland Security.
According to investigative reports, the agents negotiated prices for hand jobs and other sex acts.
In September 2018, police arrested eight people on charges of sex trafficking, money laundering, and operating a house of prostitution.
But charges against two of the suspects were dismissed last week because the two federal agents refused to testify.
Homeland Security officials did not respond to questions about why the agents didn’t show up.
One of the women arrested in the case filed a lawsuit 0n Sept. 30 in an attempt to get more information from Homeland Security, including the disclosure of the agents’ identifies and all reports generated during the probe.
