Mount Rainier is a suburb of Washington, DC, located in Prince George’s County, near Takoma Park and Hyattsville, Maryland. Its population is roughly 8,200. Prostitution is a well-documented problem in the city.  Complaints about prostitution from business owners and residents have led to several efforts by the City Council and local police to address the problem. These measures include posting two signs in 2009 at the request of the City Council that read, “City of Mount Rainier has a zero tolerance for prostitution. Violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and names posted in the news media.” The signs were removed in October 2012 due to businesses feeling they were unnecessary and that they conveyed a negative impression of the community.

Sex trafficking of children has also been documented in the city.  For example, in August 2020, Federal prosecutors charged 11 alleged members of the MS-13 street gang with sex trafficking and other charges after they say a 13-year-old runaway was repeatedly beaten and forced into prostitution in northern Virginia. Charges were unsealed in federal court; a 48-page FBI affidavit said the 13-year-old girl ran away from a group home in Fairfax in August 2018 with a 16-year-old friend who was connected to MS-13. A child trafficking task force found the 13-year-old girl nearly two months later at an apartment in Mount Rainier. The girl told authorities that she was twice beaten on her backside and legs 26 times with a baseball bat, and could barely walk after the beatings and still suffered pain years later.   The affidavit states that multiple gang members had raped her, and that the gang exploited her for prostitution on multiple occasions in northern Virginia and Maryland.

Local efforts focused on demand have included a joint prostitution detail in November 2010 conducted by officers from the Mount Rainier Police Department and detectives from the Prince George’s County Police Narcotics Enforcement Division. The operation resulted in the arrest of seven men for soliciting prostitution. In the spring and summer of 2011, Mount Rainier and Prince George’s County Police conducted four reverse stings on Rhode Island Avenue. The operations yielded 43 arrests, mostly male sex buyers, plus “a handful” of prostituted women. It does not appear that Mount Rainier police publicize the identities of arrestees.