DuBois is a city of roughly 7,500 residents in west central Pennsylvania. It is the most populous community in Clearfield County, PA, and is located about 100 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. Prostitution activity has been documented in the city for at least 40 years. This activity and its ancillary crimes has resulted in complaints to local law enforcement by residents and businesses. For example, in 2013, police were dispatched to East Long Avenue in DuBois for a reported assault. Upon arrival police learned that the reported altercation was between two woman; a prostituted woman and a suspected sex trafficker/pimp. The woman told police she had assaulted the woman for “taking the money she had earned for providing a sexual act to a man.” The woman admitted to engaging in commercial sex in exchange for money or cigarettes. The woman she had allegedly assaulted was discovered to be a sex trafficker/pimp who encouraged the woman to engage in commercial sex in exchange for money or cigarettes when she (the sex trafficker/pimp) needed them.

While police are not known to engage in proactive reverse sting operations in the city, they have been known to arrest sex buyers as a result of investigations of crimes against real victims and residential complaints to local law enforcement. For example, in June 2018, a 63-year-old Luthersburg man was arrested for  allegedly attempting to solicit a woman for sex in exchange for $200. According to the affidavit, police received a call from a woman who had been walking when a male in a dark colored truck approached her and asked if she wanted to make “an easy $200.” The woman told police when she declined the officer, he offered her more money; she refused again. The woman then asked the man what he wanted to pay her for and as he was exiting his vehicle, he told her it would be for staying the night with him. The woman ran to a nearby gas station to call police and report the incident; the responding officer was able to view the incident from surveillance video and confirmed the woman’s report. The officer was approached by two additional women who told him there was a man in a dark colored truck who asked them similar questions. In his interview with police, the suspect allegedly admitted to speaking with several women and offering them money to engage in commercial sex with him. He was charged by DuBois City Police with two misdemeanor counts each of patronizing prostitutes and promoting prostitution/loitering for purpose of prostitution, and summary counts of harassment and disorderly conduct. His identity was included in reports by local media outlets.

In January, 2023, a DuBois man was charged with two counts of promoting prostitution after an investigation discovered that the man texted a woman who later died of a drug overdose, asking her to perform a sex act on a man and saying he would pay her to do so. According to the affidavit of probable cause filed with the District Court, police were investigating the woman’s death when they discovered messages regarding the offer of money for sex. The message, later found to have come from the suspect’s phone, asked the woman to do “a big favor not for me but a friend will pay whatever you want money or dope” to perform the act, which the suspect said was something the other man wanted “before he dies.” The suspect also mentioned that every other woman who “would do it for money is in jail or dead.”