Residents who live in a Cambridge apartment building allegedly used by a brothel network operating in Boston and Washington, DC, said they had no idea what was happening nearby.
Sex trafficking survivors say that's exactly the point - and it's happening across the country. They want the buyers, who federal prosecutors say in this case range from elected officials to military members to doctors to professors, held accountable.
Federal officials say wealthy customers paid to be with women who were being exploited in a commercial sex ring.
While authorities investigate the long list of alleged buyers, Terez Durbano says she can’t help but think about the women, because that used to be her.
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“Worst five years of my life,” she told NBC10 Boston.
Durbano is a survivor of sex trafficking and said she was forced to work in similar brothels. All of the customers had two things in common – disposable income and power.
“I was in brothels like that sometimes 15-20 women were all in the room and the guy comes in a room like he’s picking out cattle,” Durbano said.
That’s why she’s not surprised authorities say the clientele includes everyone from politicians to professors.
She and others are calling for them to be charged, including former prosecutor Lauren Hersh.
“I hope they hold accountable these men who really are driving the demand for commercial sex,” said Hersh. Hersh is the national director of the World Without Exploitation campaign, aimed at stopping sex trafficking and supporting those who escape it.
“Anyone who breaks the law their name should be in the paper,” said Audrey Morrissey, the co-executive director of My Life my Choice. The nonprofit is pushing for legislation that would end the arrest of those who are exploited and expand the resources to help them.
Resources for victims of sex trafficking are available through the National Human Trafficking Hotline available at 1-(888)-373-7888 or by texting HELP or INFO to 233733
“People in the sex industry they think there’s no way out they don’t know about services,” Morrissey said.
But Durbano, who will graduate college in the spring, said she’s proof that there is a way out.
“To women that are still in the life you do not have to settle for that you can make your own dreams come true you don’t have to settle,” she said.
NBC10 Boston reached out to the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office, which would likely handle any future arrests, for information. We have yet to hear back.
