Blue Lives Matter: Cops Covered Up Sex Trafficking Ring to Receive Free Sex Acts, Lawsuit Says [View all]

[tenderfoot]

Top cops from the Fairfax County Police Department allegedly hindered a sex trafficking investigation for almost four years in exchange for sex acts.

Top cops for a local department in Virginia actively hindered a sex trafficking investigation for almost four years in exchange for free sex acts from the victimized women, according to a recently updated federal lawsuit.

An unidentified woman, referred to as “Jane Doe” in the lawsuit, alleges that 13 officers at the Fairfax County Police Department, including a captain and the former chief, berated, threatened, and coerced a detective who began looking into the trafficking ring until he dropped the investigation altogether. During that time, Doe and other victims of the operation were forced to provide free services to some of the officers, according to the suit.

“Defendants knowingly solicited and obtained commercial sex services from Jane Doe, a victim of sex trafficking, when each defendant knew or should have known that Jane Doe was made to engage in commercial sex services by means of force, fraud or coercion,” the lawsuit says.

And when Fairfax County’s sex trafficking detective William Woolf found victims of the trafficking ring who said they knew cops were soliciting sex in exchange for protecting the enterprise, his captain allegedly did nothing to help.

One lieutenant in the department went as far as threatening his job as part of the effort to keep him quiet, according to the lawsuit.

“You have six kids,” the lieutenant allegedly told Woolf. “You have to think about them.”

Fearful of what might happen if he didn’t drop the investigation, Woolf eventually gave into the demands. He agonized over the decision and cried for the first time in his professional career, according to the lawsuit.

The interruption of Woolf’s police work also began around the same time Doe and other victims in the enterprise were allegedly told to provide free sex acts to officers, including Woolf’s superior, in exchange for information that would protect the trafficking ring from law enforcement. The ring’s leader was tipped off by police thanks to the close oversight of Woolf’s work, according to the lawsuit.

Woolf was eventually transferred to the Major Crimes Division and left the department entirely in 2017 to become Director of Human Trafficking Programs for the United States Department of Justice and serve several other related roles in the federal government.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7vbnx/fairfax-county-virginia-police-sex-trafficking-cover-up-lawasuit