Geo Hand: Delta Force Tactics As Applied to the Hunt for Human Traffickers

Be advised this piece contains adult themes and content. 

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Request for Assistance

This past weekend, I received a request for assistance from a counter-human trafficking organization operating primarily in the northwestern U.S. Consequent to a recently discovered human trafficking ring that is national in scope and is an operational node here in Albuquerque. I was, therefore, provided with a link to a post on an adult dating website and needless instructions on what to collect and report on the matter.

In the day, the go-to website for organizations such as the LionHeart Foundation, which hunts traffickers, was www.BackPage.com. That page was so flagrant in its violation of human rights and trafficking of persons that the FBI promptly seized the web servers and arrested the owners. Similar dating sites scrambled to fill the void left by BackPage, and when the music finally stopped, the new king was www.SkipTheGames.com.

Back Page

All my former persons of interest, whom I watched from BackPage, now reside in some capacity on SkipTheGames—same photos, same narratives, same angles. At the time of BackPage’s demise, we felt elation as hunters of traffickers—a feeling that gave way to immediate panic at the loss of our staple resource for hunting those traffickers. Ah, but we were delinquent in recalling that nature abhors a vacuum, and the next “BackPage” came right along in short order.

The representative site above was the only info I was given, along with a request to find the pimp! That may seem rather difficult — but at face value only. There had to be a way to contact the victim of this trafficking event and to make an appointment with (in this case) her on that page somewhere. And as anticipated, I found the options at the bottom of the page.

To schedule an appointment, you can call or email. I first sent an email using a ghost email account from Yahoo.com. My comfort zone in these cases doesn’t immediately include talking in person with these women, but I do it without hesitation to progress the case.

As predicted, there was no real vigil on the other end of my email. I then texted a message to find out where the victim was staying. I used a burner phone number application to avoid compromising my personal number.

The First Exchange

In the first exchange, I already scored the cross streets where the victim was located. It should be noted that it is highly unlikely that this dialogue was between me and the victim directly. Rather, it was between me and her trafficker. In many cases, the victims are not even allowed to have a phone. This is a method of strict control exercised by the trafficker. Motels and apartments are the locations of choice for these events. Looking at a map I immediately saw an apartment in the northeast quadrant of that intersection. Rarely is the motel room or apartment number given out immediately.

Once I arrived at the apartment, I informed her that I had arrived and asked for the apartment number. With that number, I could set up with a good view of the apartment door. With the proper social engineering, I could get her to come to the door and snap some FID photos with my professional Canon camera. As it turned out, her druther was to come outside and meet me to bring me to the apartment. All the better; that was still getting her to show her face.

I quickly chose a random silver Toyota Tacoma pickup truck and set up on it in a vantage point. After giving her the truck’s details, I just waited. The victim and her pimp, to my surprise, moved to the truck and stood. The next message asked me, “Where the hell?” I was. I told them I was out walking around the building looking for them. They split up and walked in opposite rotations around the building. I grabbed my FID frames.

(* in some cases, the pimp will be the only one to take the money from the John — control!)

I watched the agitated couple return to their apartment, noting they were in unit H. That was enough for a day. But it had only taken me about 90 minutes, and there was still most of the day ahead. Also, I had jilted an in-call scenario, one in which the John  is required to travel to the victim’s location. I noticed that in her post, she also offered an out-call opportunity. This would allow me to jilt her again and gain more important data.

Map reconnaissance revealed the nearest library. I have an affinity for libraries when my out-call jilt opportunities are concerned. This is because they afford me a public parking lot as my cover. Often, I find a library with residents right across the street on several sides. By parking near the street, I have both an offset and an overwatch that support decent frame grabs.

Outcall Services

I moved immediately to the library location that appeared suitable in the satellite photos. I found it to be excellent. I swapped out my burner number for a new one in my phone app and began to text the victim again. Her offering outcalls meant (to me) that either she had a car, her pimp had a car, or there was another player with a car. As my luck had been splendid thus far, perhaps the same pimp from before would drive her to the meeting and I could thus get his plate. I could then run the plate to get the registered owner, address, and other pertinent data.

At this point, it’s helpful to mention how scrutiny from Law Enforcement Officials (LEO) plays out because LEO thinks differently in these matters due to their frequently absurd Rules of Engagement (ROE):

“What happens if she actually knocks on that random resident’s door?”

“If nobody answers, then she gets pissed off and leaves. If someone answers, they tell her she has the wrong house, then she gets pissed off and leaves.”

The LEO is nonetheless very reluctant to let this scenario play out. I can only wonder what their brilliant plan to find the pimp’s car would have been and wish them luck. This is the very reason for a synergy between the private sector and LEO in the hunt — strengths mutually offset weaknesses: I can’t arrest someone, you can’t let someone knock on a door.

Eventually, I saw the victim arrive at the house, though I did not see a car. In fact, her pimp drove her there and dropped her off several houses down the street, allowing her to travel the short final distance on foot. After knocking several times and nobody answering the door, she walked to the corner of the street and made a phone call — my phone rang. I didn’t want to listen to the “why you gotta game me” browbeating so I deleted the burner number as I was through with her anyway.

After another phone call, she began to walk in another direction. Certainly, she was following her pimp’s instructions to meet him nearby. I crept along, carefully following her. A car did pull up and she got in. Snap-snap went the shutter of my Canon 5D Mark II. I followed the car, planning to only make two turns with it before dropping off. Two turns were enough to confirm that the car had returned to the apartment from before — BAM!

It is short work from the plate to determine if it belongs to the car it is on. If there are any doubts, the VIN associated with the plate can be checked against the VIN as it appears on the front driver’s side windshield. (Then, one can find a nearly bottomless pit of personal information about the registered owner. This information, found through database services like Accurint LexisNexis, may include his relatives, neighbors, and work associates.)

My arrival time that day was approximately 1130 local ABQ hrs. My time off-target was 1301 local ABQ hrs. I put together and delivered a report by about 1430 that day. The following day, I was informed that federal agents from Albuquerque’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) office had accepted the case as-is.

An Overall Good Day

All in all, it was a very good day. As for what went wrong, my primary camera mysteriously stopped working when I tried to take my first FID photo. This compelled me to divert to my backup camera. When I arrived at my office to process my report, the camera had resumed normal function, prompting me to look upward and shake a clenched fist at the heavens.

By Almighty God and with honor,
geo sends