Nevada sex trafficking bill appears headed to final OK

CARSON CITY — Despite concerns that customers who mistake an underage prostitute for an adult could end up in prison for life, a sex trafficking bill now appears on its way to final approval in the state Senate later this week.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Tick Segerblom, D-Las Vegas, said after a two-hour hearing Tuesday that he will support Assembly Bill 67. Three other members of the committee also expressed support during the hearings.

Segerblom said his committee will back the bill during a work session today and send it to the Senate floor for final approval. The bill passed the Assembly 41-0 and probably will be signed by Gov. Brian Sandoval.

The bill is the key piece of legislation proposed this session by Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto. It would create the new crime of sex trafficking — a charge that could face anyone who “induces, causes, recruits, harbors, transports, provides, obtains or maintains a child to engage in prostitution.”

If convicted, the offender would be sentenced to a 15-year-to-life sentence if the prostitute were under age 14. The sentence would be 10 years to life if the child were 14 or 15 and at least five years in prison if the child were 16 or 17.

Harsh sentences also would apply in cases in which an adult prostitute was forced into the activity by a pimp.

The bill also states that it is not a defense for a defendant to assert he did not have knowledge of the prostitute’s age or assumed the prostitute was an adult.

Steve Yeager expressed concern about giving a life sentence to someone who legitimately thought a prostitute was an adult. Masto, however, contended that should not pose a problem because the bill gives judges discretion to apply the sex trafficking offense or charge people with pandering or solicitation of a prostitute.

“I would hope a prosecutor would not go after a customer who solicits a 17-year-old in a bar,” Segerblom said.

Masto said the bill’s goal is to go after pimps who enslave children, not after a one-time customer who somehow mistook a child as an adult prostitute.

“I would be more comfortable if the intent of the bill is on the record,” Yeager replied.

Sen. Aaron Ford, D-Las Vegas, said he had a hard time believing someone “accidentally traffics kids.”

Both Sen. Mark Hutchison, R-Las Vegas, and Greg Brower, R-Reno, gave enthusiastic support for Masto and the bill.

“We are spending far too much time worrying about those who commit these crimes,” Brower said.

Under the bill, the assumption is someone under 18 cannot consent to voluntarily becoming a prostitute. Lawyer Allen Lichtenstein, representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, testified he does not believe minors can give such consent.

But Lichtenstein said adults can consent to being prostitutes. He said the sex trafficking statute should not apply in cases of adult prostitutes unless that person is forced by a pimp to prostitute.

Amy Coffee, representing the Nevada Attorneys for Criminal Justice, predicted the bill’s constitutionality would be challenged.

“If we are putting someone in prison for 15 years to life, we want the person who is really going after the teenager,” she said.

But Jennifer Reed, a representative of the Sex Workers Outreach Project, said she meets homeless youth who “engage in sex for survival” and have nothing to do with pimps.

She said she knows a case in which a girl told her the closest she has to a pimp is “my friend Emily who helps me find customers” and also does tricks with customers.

Brett Kandt, a special deputy attorney general, said in such a case both girls would be subject to the juvenile justice system and neither would be tried for sex trafficking.

Contact Capital Bureau Chief Ed Vogel at evogel@reviewjournal.com or 775-687-3901.