Harrison County is located in southern Mississippi, and has a population of about 210,000. Its largest cities are Biloxi and Gulfport.  Prostitution activity, including cases of alleged sex trafficking of adults and minors and assaults on individuals exploited in commercial sex, has been reported in the county for decades. Businesses and residents lodge complaints about prostitution to police, and federal authorities have investigated cases of illegal immigrants being harbored in the county for the purpose of engaging in prostitution.  The Sheriff’s Office often collaborates with local police departments to conduct reverse stings, and local police have also conducted such operations independently.  For example, the Biloxi Police Department has conducted street-level and web-based stings that resulted in the arrest of multiple men. In October 1995, BPD officers staged a street-level operation using a female undercover officer as a decoy, and intercepted 23 male sex buyers after they attempted to purchase sex from her.  In November, 2009, seventeen people were arrested for charges involving drugs and prostitution in a large-scale operation involving police agencies from all along the gulf coast and targeted escort service and individuals listed on Craigslist. The agencies involved included the Biloxi Police, as well as the police departments of D’Iberville, Gulfport Police, and Ocean Springs, the Sheriff’s Offices of Jackson County and Harrison County, and the multi-jurisdictional Jackson County Narcotics Task Force All arrested agreed to sexual acts in exchange for money once they met undercover officers. In June, 2012, Biloxi police arrested thirteen people in a prostitution sting. Seven men and six women were taken into custody for prostitution or solicitation, including men who drove the women to meet sex buyers at a hotel. Several also faced misdemeanor drug charges. Gulfport police have conducted street-level reverse stings eight to nine times per year, on average, since 1992. They began conducting web-based stings in 2001, and conduct them about once per year. In 2006, they began publicly disclosing the identities of arrested sex buyers.