Of all the scourges that our nation faces, perhaps none is as purely diabolical as that of human trafficking.
This is modern-day slavery, with all of the refinement and high-tech advantages that any other black market in the world employs, but with a gravity unlike any other. Those involved are the scum of the earth, full stop, and they must be fully stopped for us to ever live in the sort of world that we dreamed of growing up.
This week, in Ohio, authorities put a major dent into the practice.
A firefighter, college professor and a Cleveland-area city councilman were among 161 people arrested in a sex sting operation last week, described as the state’s largest focused on human trafficking.
Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, law enforcement officials from multiple counties, social service providers and former human trafficking victims met in the Ohio Statehouse on Monday to talk about the initiative.
Dubbed “Operation Ohio Knows,” the weeklong sting was intended to create a deterrent for those who seek sex for pay or profit, Yost said.
And it gets worse:
Three of the perpetrators were willing to pay to have sex with people they thought were minors. Ten minors reported missing were recovered during a simultaneous operation carried out by the U.S. Marshals Service.
Americans have been keenly aware of the power of sex traffickers in our modern era, particularly as the curious case of Jeffrey Epstein made headlines in recent years.
