Lynchburg is a city of approximately 79,000 residents, located in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in central Virginia.  Prostitution activity is well documented in the city, and is associated with an array of local problems, including human trafficking. Trafficking has been reported to the human trafficking hotline of the National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC).

Among the efforts to ameliorate the problems associated with the local commercial sex market have been attempts to combat  demand.  Between 1999 and 2000, the Lynchburg Police Department incorporated the use of street-level reverse stings as part of its Weed and Seed Program. It conducted at least four such operations (referred to locally as “prostitution reversals”) during that program. In June 2014, The Lynchburg News & Advance reported that LPD officers still conduct anti-prostitution investigations on a regular basis, and had deploying web-based reverse stings (by “creating fake [online] advertisements to try to snare potential solicitors”).