Manteca is located in San Joaquin County in Northern California, near Stockton.  Sex trafficking and prostitution are longstanding problems throughout the county, and in the citisies and towns within it.  For example, in May, 2015 a federal grand jury returned an indictment against a Manteca man, charging him with sex trafficking of a minor.  The 52 year old man was accused of recruiting a 16-year-old girl to engage in prostitution while he was was employed at the Bureau of Prisons from February to March of 2015. According to court documents, he rented hotel rooms for the girl in the Sacramento area, and helped her post ads online.

When the number of human trafficking cases was steadily increasing in 2016 and 2017 throughout San Joaquin County (including Manteca), the District Attorney’s Office announced it was making efforts to educate the public and urging local residents to be more vigilant in combating the issue.

“There’s a lot of agencies in our county that still don’t understand how widespread this crime is,” San Joaquin County Deputy District Attorney Elton Grau said. “It’s in Lodi. It’s in Stockton. It’s in Manteca. It’s in Tracy. It’s everywhere. No city escapes this crime right now.” [Lodi News Sentinel, May 20, 2017]

In January 2017, a Manteca man was arrested following a human trafficking operation that had an officer posing online as a prostitute for hire. In March of 2017, 10 people had been arrested in connection with a human trafficking operation in rural Stockton that led to the rescue of a girl and a woman, according to the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office. In a statement from the public information officer at the district attorney’s office, there were 28 cases of human trafficking, pimping and pandering in San Joaquin County in 2016.  In the first third of 2017, there had been three confirmed cases of human trafficking and more tips and leads were being explored. Two unconnected long-term investigations into human trafficking in the county resulted in the rescue of eight girls, ages 14 to 17, and the arrest of almost two dozen people in early 2017.

Among the tactics used to address such problems are those designed to curtail consumer-level demand.  For example, in April 2017, eighteen people were arrested in a human trafficking sting in Manteca.  Manteca police coordinated with the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office to conduct the sting to rescue victims of human trafficking, and to arrest the sexual predators who target minors. Some of the charges were offenses related to prostitution. Three of the arrests were for contacting a minor with the intent to commit a sexual offense. Those three subjects were booked at San Joaquin County Jail on felony charges.  The identities of the arrested sex buyers were released to the public.