Wayne County is a county of about 91,000 residents, located in upstate New York on the shore of Lake Ontario near Rochester. Its county seat is the city of Lyons. Prostitution and sex trafficking have been well-documented in the county and surrounding areas, including a case of three local residents being arrested for their participation in the trafficking and sexual assault of a minor girl in December 2015. At that time, Wayne County Sheriff’s Department deputies reported the interception of a 32-year-old male on charges of first-degree rape, third-degree rape, first-degree sexual abuse, first-degree course of sexual conduct, endangering the welfare of a child, four counts of sex trafficking and four counts of compelling prostitution, after the man allegedly provided a 15-year-old girl with crack cocaine, to which she became addicted in the summer of 2015, and then allegedly arranged for her to be sexually abused by older men in exchange for the drug. In the days that followed the trafficker’s arrest, two additional men, ages 24 and 48, were arrested and charged with purchasing sex acts from the minor victim in exchange for drugs. The men were charged with several crimes, including rape, forcible touching, and endangering the welfare of a child, and had their identities publicized heavily in press.

In October 2015, officers with the Village of Newark Police Department, in partnership with the Wayne County Sheriff’s Department and New York State Police, reported the arrests of seven alleged sex buyers and one sexually exploited person following an anti-prostitution investigation. Logistical details about the sting (including whether or not it was conducted using web advertisements and/or police decoys) were not disclosed. All of the arrestees’ identities were publicized in press.