Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in Pennsylvania, with approximately 300,000 residents. It serves as the government seat of Allegheny County. For decades, the city has experienced a wide array of problems associated with commercial sex, including sex trafficking and violence against prostituted and trafficked persons. For example, in May, 2022, a man faced facing multiple […]
Pinellas Park, located in the Tampa Bay area near St. Petersburg, in Pinellas County, and has a population of approximately 53,000. Prostitution activity has been well-documented in the city, surrounding communities, and other county areas. Consumer level demand provides the revenue stream for all prostitution and sex trafficking, and has therefore been targeted by local law […]
Pinellas County covers parts of the Tampa Bay area and has a population of approximately 959,000 residents. The area has well-documented, persistent problems with prostitution and sex trafficking, as well as homicides and serial murders specifically targeting prostituted persons. Pinellas County was an “early adopter” of anti-demand tactics: St. Petersburg, FL, a city containing over […]
Pierce County, located in the southern Puget Sound region of Washington state, has a population of roughly 921,000 residents. The unincorporated areas of the county as well as the cities within it (such as Tacoma, the county’s major population center) have identified prostitution as a persistent problem, and there have been numerous local cases of […]
Phoenix is the largest commercial hub of and most populous city in Arizona, with approximately 1.625 million residents. It is the sixth largest city in the country, and serves as the county seat of Maricopa County. Situated within a day’s drive from the Mexican border and at the crossroads of several interstate highways, the Phoenix […]
Petersburg is located in southeast Virginia, about 25 miles south of Richmond, and has a population of approximately 33,000. Prostitution has been identified as a substantial problem in the city, generating complaints and collateral crimes. Its location along major interstate highways 85 and 95 have contributed to the city serving as a stop on domestic […]
Philadelphia is a city of approximately 1.58 million residents, within Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania. It is the state’s largest city, and the fifth largest city in the United States. Prostitution and commercial sex trafficking have posed formidable problems for the city, with activities frequently concentrated in the Kensington area. Both street-level and indoor prostitution have generated […]
Peoria is a city of about 113,000 residents in central Illinois, west of Bloomington IL along Interstate 74. Law enforcement and public health officials have estimated during the 2010s that there were about 140 prostituted women in Peoria, with an average age of about twenty-three. Numerous problems are associated with the local commercial sex market, […]
Pekin is a city of about 30,000 residents located roughly 10 miles south of Peoria, in Tazewell County, Illinois. Prostitution activity has been well-documented in the city and surrounding communities, and in unincorporated areas of the county. Police say that many of the prostituted persons in Pekin are from Peoria, and are dropped off by […]
Pearson is a small rural town of just under 2,000 residents in southeast Georgia. In response to community complaints about prostitution, the Atkinson County Sheriff’s Office conducted an ad hoc reverse sting in 2011. After receiving a tip about prostitution at a local motel, law enforcement raided the premises and arrested one woman and eight […]
Demand Forum is powered by the National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) and directed by Dr. Michael Shively, NCOSE's Senior Advisor on Research and Data Analysis. It was originally developed by Dr. Shively and Abt Associates with grant support from the National Institute of Justice. In January 2020 the website transferred to NCOSE. In January 2021, work began on a new grant from NIJ (#2020-75-CX-0011) to update and expand the content presented on Demand Forum.
