Baltimore is not only the place where police treat sex workers badly
It's heartening to see that in its highly critical report on Baltimore's police department, the U.S. Department of Justice excoriated the police for ignoring sexual assault complaints by minority women, including sex workers and transgender women.The DOJ report not only concluded that the force had systematically violated the rights of African-Americans, but it also highlighted a police culture that was downright toxic toward sex workers and transgender people, according to the New York Times. Specifically, sex workers interviewed by DOJ investigators complained that officers often ignored their reports of being sexually assaulted by clients and that some cops actually coerced sexual favors from these women in exchange for not arresting them.
I'm delighted the feds and mainstream media are finally spotlighting this issue, but as I documented in my recent book, Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law, the Baltimore police's treatment of sex workers is far from unique. Indifference and outright harassment of sex workers have been found in police departments from Alaska and California to New York City and Washington, D.C. For my book, I interviewed a number of transgender sex workers who told me that the police not only ignored their reports of sexual assault but sometimes victimized the workers themselves.
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I'm delighted the feds and mainstream media are finally spotlighting this issue, but as I documented in my recent book, Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law, the Baltimore police's treatment of sex workers is far from unique. Indifference and outright harassment of sex workers have been found in police departments from Alaska and California to New York City and Washington, D.C. For my book, I interviewed a number of transgender sex workers who told me that the police not only ignored their reports of sexual assault but sometimes victimized the workers themselves.
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