10 victims were also rescued as a result of the operation.
At a venue where so much of the focus is on the fictional heroes in comic books and movies, it can be easy to forget that real heroes are out and about doing their jobs every single day. Such was the case during this year's San Diego Comic-Con International when the San Diego Sheriff's Office in a multi-agency operation apprehended 14 suspects in a sex trafficking sting at the event. These potential sex buyers were taken into custody when 10 victims were recovered.
Here's what the San Diego Sheriff's Office had to say about the matter via its official X account:
California Attorney General Rob Bonta stated that "Unfortunately, sex traffickers capitalize on large scale events such as Comic-Con to exploit their victims for profit." The arrests were made between Thursday and Saturday, with one of the recovered victims found to only be 16 years old. Crisis intervention and case management will be offered to the victims as appropriate. Here was the response from SDCC organizers:
Obviously we find this very disturbing and, while we were not made aware of this operation, it is our understanding that the arrests were made outside of the event. We work closely with a variety of law enforcement entities throughout the year and stand ready to assist in any way we can.
It's unclear what the relevancy would be for the operation to have been brought to the attention of the organizers. Regardless, it's nice to see a win against human traffickers utilizing an event that's meant to bring people of all stripes together for some innocent fun.
Source: NBC 7 San Diego
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