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El Paso, Texas •The Federal Bureau of Investigation is investigating an underage-prostitution ring involving middle and high school students throughout El Paso, Ysleta Independent School District officials said.
FBI officials said Tuesday there is an investigation at YISD but would not comment if there was an investigation in other school districts in the city.
Patricia Ayala, spokeswoman for YISD, also confirmed the FBI investigation at YISD. A statement from the district said the investigation involved "local middle and high schools."
Officials at El Paso, Clint and Canutillo school districts said they had not been contacted by the FBI regarding the investigation. Socorro Independent School District officials did not respond to requests from the El Paso Times for comment.
YISD officials were notified by the FBI of the alleged prostitution ring in December 2012, YISD officials said in a statement released on Monday.
"Due to student confidentiality laws, the Ysleta Independent School District is prohibited from disclosing specific details of the alleged underage prostitution ring currently under investigation by the FBI," YISD officials said in a statement. "However, officials at Ysleta High School were notified in December 2012 that an investigation into underage prostitution was under way at local middle and high schools."
YISD officials declined to comment further on the investigation. The announcement of the investigation comes days after an arrest affidavit alleged that a 16-year-old Ysleta High School student was prostituted on the website Backpage for sexual services to a YISD volunteer.
"At that time, the FBI requested that Ysleta High School officials not discuss the matter with anyone, including district administration," the YISD statement said. "After this meeting with the FBI, Ysleta High School officials were approached by the student for assistance with issues outside of the investigation that cannot be disclosed. No other details are available at this time, YISD will continue to cooperate fully with local law enforcement agencies in their investigation."
El Paso Police Department spokesman Sgt. Chris Mears directed questions on the investigation to FBI officials.
During a press conference on Monday to announce the arrest of two suspected sex traffickers, FBI officials declined to comment on the case involving the 16-year-old Ysleta student.
Middle and high school students are some of the most vulnerable when it comes to sex trafficking, said John Martin, executive director of the Paso del Norte Center of Hope.
"It is very important that we target the students in elementary, middle and high school and educate them on the dangers of sex trafficking and create preventative programs," Martin said. "By definition, the most vulnerable to being trafficked are the poor, young and the immigrant. And in many cases these students fell into all three categories. So it is vital we reach out and educate our young children."
The Center of Hope, along with other anti-sex trafficking organizations, have launched several efforts to reach out to area schools to inform students of the danger and risks of sex trafficking, Martin said. A recent effort by the center, along with the organization Youth for Christ, is to create trafficking prevention programs at schools in El Paso, Ysleta and Socorro school districts.
"We have good experience with the schools but we need to get more involved," Martin said. "Right now we are in summer break at the districts, so we are looking to reintroduce them (students) to some concepts in the fall. The schools desperately need to get involved from the prevention standpoint, they do so much in a similar nature for other issues but they don't really talk about trafficking. They talk about sexual transmitted diseases and things like that, but we need to get sex trafficking part of those discussions."
Some of the issues the organizations talk to students about include educating them on what trafficking is, why traffickers target young students, the ways traffickers get their victims and ways to report suspected traffickers, Martin said.
"The average age for a young girl to be introduced to prostitution is between 12 and 13, for boys it is not much better, it (the average age) is between 13 and 14," Martin said. "We let the students know they are being targeted. They (traffickers) look for vulnerabilities, which can be something as simple as being upset with your parents because they didn't give you money for something you wanted, so you went out looking for additional cash. It could also be drug-related issues or many different thing. When you look at a child, because of their age and maturity, they are much more vulnerable than an adult."
In 2013, the National Human Trafficking Resource Center, which is operated by the Polaris Project, a nonprofit anti-human-trafficking group based in Washington, D.C., received more than 2,200 calls reporting suspected sex trafficking cases in Texas. Overall, Texas ranked second in the nation, only behind California, in most reported cases of sex trafficking.
Administrators at YISD and board members could not be reached comment.