Irving is a city of about 254,000 residents, situated northwest of Dallas in Dallas County, Texas.  Prostitution has been a well-documented local problem for decades, generating complaints to police from local residents and businesses.  Cases of sex trafficking and a wide range of associated crimes have also occurred as the result of the local sex trade, including the targeted homicides and serial killing of women being sold for sex. Many local sex trafficking case involve the victimization of children, and child sexual abuse materials (CSAM, often called “child pornography” in criminal laws). For example, in May, 2019, Irving Police  arrested two people for trafficking a 15-year-old child, on charges including, trafficking a child, compelling prostitution, sexual assault of a child, and promotion of “child pornography.” The victim had been last seen by her mother the prior month near her home in a neighboring city, and the mother, who had been monitoring her daughter’s active email account, reported the account had been accessed in Irving. The same email address had also been used to open an account to solicit sex. Irving Police officers used that information to respond to the location and rescue the child. Investigators determined the suspects would use websites, like the one the victim’s mother discovered, to advertise sexual services to customers while moving the victim to various motel rooms.

In August, 2022, a 36-year-old man who trafficked a 13-year-old girl out of a hotel room in Irving was sentenced to more than 11 years in federal prison, announced U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas. The offender was indicted in December 2019 and pleaded guilty to sex trafficking of children in June 2021. According to plea papers, the man admitted that he advertised a 13-year-old girl’s sexual services on numerous commercial sex websites, including CityXGuide, a site that federal agents seized in summer 2020. (CityXGuide’s owner subsequently pleaded guilty to reckless disregard of sex trafficking and conspiracy to engage in interstate transportation in aid of racketeering and is awaiting sentencing. The site remains out of commission.). In October, 2019, the man met the child and began posting her for commercial sexual abuse on websites and thereafter took the proceeds. In November, 2019, he brought the child to a hotel room in Irving, where she was abused by multiple customers. Meanwhile, law enforcement agents working the missing child case noticed her photograph on a CityXGuide advertisement. An undercover agent texted the associated phone number to arrange a meeting at the hotel. Posing as a commercial sex customer, he identified the room she used to meet customers and immediately recovered the child from the room. Agents later reviewed surveillance video from the hotel and observed the offender rent a room, escort the child upstairs, leave her there, and then return after her abusers departed to retrieve cash. Homeland Security Investigations’ Dallas Field Office conducted the investigation with assistance from the Fort Worth Police Department.

Among the ways in which the community has attempted to address such crimes have be the use of demand reduction tactics.  Local law enforcement has on at least one occasion launched an investigation to identify “customers” of recovered minor trafficking victims. In November 2015, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement released a press release announcing that a 33-year-old Irving resident had been found guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of children. The man had reportedly “purchased” commercial sex acts from a 12-year-old female who was being sex trafficked– with four other minor girls– by a 19-year-old pimp. The details of the investigation leading to the sex buyer arrest were not disclosed, though ICE reported that the trafficker, who was also found guilty of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of children, had “made several phone calls seeking potential commercial sex customers for the minor females,” during which he reached the “john” who “agreed to come to [a] location to engage in a commercial sex act.” The offender reportedly selected the victim after the trafficker “told the four minor females to line up so the men could select who they wanted to have sex with.” The man reportedly selected the youngest, an unnamed 12-year-old girl, and “negotiated the price for sex with a girl down to $50. Shortly thereafter, he engaged in commercial sexual abuse acts with the victim, paid the trafficker and his minor male friend about $50, and left. Following his arrest and trial, the offender’s identity was released to the public, and heavily publicized in the press.

In January, 2023, forty-six individuals were recently arrested during a multi-agency operation – that included the Irving Police Department – targeting the demand for commercial sex across North Texas. The joint law enforcement operation coincided with the Department of Homeland Security’s Blue Campaign to highlight Human Trafficking awareness month.  Among those arrested were a volunteer firefighter, youth pastor, a high school teacher and football coach, and the director of operations for a large hospital network in North Texas.