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 News from Around the Americas | January 2006 
Americans Helping Fuel Mexico's Child-Sex Industry
 WorldNetDaily.com
| | In the U.S., Congress passed the Protect Act in 2003, which allows for the arrest of people who plan to go abroad and have sex with a minor. |
Child prostitution continues unabated in Mexican tourist resorts and border cities despite a crackdown on pedophiles in both Mexico and the United States, according to a report by the Houston Chronicle.
The number of child victims of prostitution, pornography and human trafficking in Mexico has increased from 16,000 to 20,000 in the past five years, investigators estimate.
Among those who pay for sex with boys and girls are American, Canadian and European tourists, the Houston paper says.
The United Nations Children's Fund says Mexican authorities now are addressing the problem – after once being in denial – but they are hindered by a weak justice system, police corruption and lack of facilities to help homeless children.
Some of the worst abuses, according to investigators, occur in famous seaside resorts such as Acapulco and Cancun.
In Acapulco, hundreds of homeless youths hang out in the heart of the resort where they are picked up by pedophiles. Some of the children are sold by pimps.
Mexican prosecutors are limited by a law requiring the need for someone to file a detailed accusation against a specific suspect before they can take action, the Chronicle says.
Two years ago, for example, federal police arrested 13 Canadians and Americans who allegedly formed a network that organized sex tourism and child pornography in Acapulco. Last year, two of the suspects committed suicide in prison and the others were released by a federal judge who said evidence against them was insufficient.
A Mexican child protection official said defense attorneys allegedly bribed key child witnesses so they wouldn't testify, the paper reported.
In the U.S., Congress passed the Protect Act in 2003, which allows for the arrest of people who plan to go abroad and have sex with a minor. The measure also increased the maximum sentence for child-sex tourism to 30 years from 10 for first-time offenders and to a life sentence for those with previous convictions.
The Department of Homeland Security's Operation Predator has arrested 13 men who planned to have sex with children abroad.
In February, an FBI sting operation nabbed seven men who planned to go to Ensenada, Mexico, where they were promised sex with boys as young as 9.
The fake vacation was set up by an FBI undercover agent who had infiltrated the North American Man/Boy Love Association. |
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