Two women rescued from forced sex work in separate investigations

Police rescued two women from coerced or forced sex work last week in two separate human trafficking investigations. Each case concerned vulnerable victims who were tricked into thinking the men pimping them were their boyfriends.

A 36-year-old Amsterdam man was arrested for the sexual exploitation of a Leusden woman with an intellectual disability. The woman, also 36, collected roughly 35 thousand euros from prostitution, and transferred all of the money to the man.

“He had told her that the money was for their future together,” police said. The suspect was remanded into custody and was still behind bars on Thursday when police announced the arrest.

A second incident involved a 25-year-old man from Bussum who was taken into custody this week for exploiting a 19-year-old woman from Hilversum two years ago. “In the Hilversum case, the 19-year-old victim was forced to perform sexual acts with several men,” police said.

“The woman from Hilversum was approached with the ‘loverboy method’ and then she had to have sex with several men over [an unspecified] period of time.”

The “loverboy method” refers to a pimp where young people, often school-aged children, are lured into a sexual relationship with someone they think cares for them. The suspect transitions this relationship using power dynamics and manipulation to convince the girl to have sex with other men, usually his friends.

The victims are then typically pushed into forced prostitution, handing over all cash to the pimp, who frequently employs blackmail and secretly recorded videos to keep the victim under his control.

“The Human Trafficking Team investigates cases in which people are exploited or forced to do certain things that are not their choosing, and which benefit other people,” police said. “These include, for example, forcing someone to commit criminal offenses, having someone work under appalling conditions at too low a salary, or forcing someone into prostitution."