Harris County is a county of over 4.4 million residents, located in southwest Texas. Houston is the county’s seat and largest city, but it also contains the communities of Spring, Humble and Cloverleaf. For the purposes of Demand Forum website, we have limited the tactics and operations discussed here to county-level policies and/or sting operations that occur in unincorporated or otherwise undisclosed areas.

The Harris County Sheriff’s Office conducts periodic web stings targeting sex buyers. During these operations, HCSO deputies post decoy advertisements to websites known for commercial sex sales. Undercover female deputies then field phone calls from individuals as they respond to the listing, and set up a meeting with them at a prearranged location. To protect the sanctity of future operations, the HCSO rarely discloses these locations. In 2017, a former Houston police officer was among more than 250 sex buyers and traffickers arrested on prostitution charges during a month-long series of reverse stings by the Houston Police Department and the Harris County Sheriff’s Office.  The operation in Harris County and Houston was coordinated with similar efforts elsewhere as part of the National Johns Suppression Initiative during June and July of 2017, in which law enforcement agencies in 17 states participated. During the first three months of 2018, more than 120 people were arrested for compelling prostitution or solicitation of prostitution, as part of a larger initiative cracking down on prostitution and sex trafficking. In April 2018, an additional 33 sex buyers were arrested.

On occasion, sheriff’s deputies have also conducted street-level reverse stings along major roadways in the county (such as Interstate 45 North, the Eastex Freeway, and Beltway 8). In these instances, HSCO operatives have similarly opted not to reveal the exact location of the arrests. For example, in September 2013, 15 johns were arrested after soliciting sex from female deputies posing as prostituted women “along the I-45 North and Eastex Freeway frontage roads, just south of Beltway 8.” Similarly, in August 2014, the HCSO reported it arrested 76 johns during a two-week reverse sting operation, the location of which was not disclosed. Following the investigation, the HCSO Sheriff stated:

“Prostitution is intertwined with sex slavery and illegal drugs as part of an insidious network of criminal enterprises… This is not the first time we have used undercover male and female deputies to disrupt these illegal operations, and it won’t be the last. If you buy sex in Harris County, the price can also include jail time.”

Sex buyers (as well as sex sellers) routinely have their names, photos, and other identifying information released to the local media. For example, in September, 2018, Houston police released 54 new booking photos of people arrested in August for either compelling prostitution or solicitation of prostitution.