NBA Staff

October 29, 2018 By NBA Staff

The REAL Story Behind the Lyon County Sheriff’s “Sex Trafficking” Report

(Chuck Muth) – If you believe the headlines, you might jump to the conclusion that Lyon County’s legal brothels are Ground Zero for an international sex trafficking ring…

“Trafficking signs seen in brothels”
“Audit of Hof’s 4 legal sites finds lack of enforcement”
“A third of prostitutes registered in 2017 had red flags of possible human trafficking”
“Audit finds signs of human trafficking at brothels in Nevada county”
“Lyon County finds possible signs of trafficking at brothels”
“Lyon Co. Sheriff’s Audit Found Issues in Vetting of Legal Prostitutes”
“Lyon County increasing enforcement at brothels”

And you’d be wrong.

Not your fault. Misleading, hysteria-inducing click-bait headlines are how they sell papers. It’s one of the reasons why the term “fake news” has become so popular. So let’s look deeper into the story and beyond the headlines…

First notice the use of “weasel words” so often deployed by politicians. (For example: “I don’t *INTEND* to raise taxes”)

Weasel words allow news publications to defend their misleading stories and headlines as technically accurate. There were “signs” of trafficking. There were “red flags.” Trafficking might be “possible.”

The truth is, NO SEX TRAFFICKING in any of Lyon County’s four legal brothels was discovered during the reported audit. Not one arrest. Not one citation. Not one fine.

In addition, this wasn’t an “Audit of Hof’s 4 legal sites.”

This was an audit of the processes and procedures at the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office (LCSO) – NOT the brothels – to make sure the LCSO itself was doing adequate screening of brothel applicants before issuing them a work card.

And that’s a critical point overlooked in the headlines: The brothels don’t issue work cards! The sheriff’s office does.

No one is allowed to work in one of Lyon County’s legal brothels unless and until the sheriff’s office, not the brothels, clear them after conducting FBI and other background checks.

Indeed, as Sheriff Al McNeil noted at the town hall forum on Lyon County Question 1 last week, the sheriff’s office has been issuing work cards for brothel workers since 1990 and…

“The sheriff’s office has not done a good job in vetting the applicants coming through the brothel system. We own it. … The problem lies in the vetting that we should have been doing for the past 28 years that we haven’t been doing. … When we looked at this internal audit we saw the problems that were associated; that we weren’t doing a good job.”

Again, this entire four-month investigation was of the SHERIFF’S OFFICE, not the brothels. The spot-check of “Hof’s 4 legal sites” – as accurately reported only by the Nevada Independent – was solely an “educational visit” with federal ICE agents in an effort to help LCSO tighten up its screening procedures.

The results of the internal audit were recently submitted to the Lyon County Commission. And that report, too, has been largely misrepresented by news outlets and cherry-picked by opponents. So let’s take a look at some key points…

1.) Under “Findings,” the LCSO noted that “a recent brothel statement” indicated that “134 non-sex worker support staff” worked in the brothels but LCSO “can only document 79.”

Sounds like violations, right? Wrong.

The fact is there are a number of employees – including IT personnel, marketers and restaurant workers at the NV 50 grill – who are not tied directly to the brothels and aren’t required to obtain brothel work cards.

Funny how that little fact, which was included in the sheriff’s report, somehow never made it into news stories. Nor – again printed right in the “Findings” for anyone to see – this statement: “There are no significant public safety concerns with these employees as it relates to criminal cases.”

Go figure.

2.) In the review of work cards for sex workers themselves, the LCSO report found…

22 applicants who “self-disclosed being foreign-born and/or non-citizens”
13 who “made self-disclosure of active criminal cases”
19 who “self-disclosed prior prostitution convictions”
4 who “self-disclosed active prostitution arrest without case closure”
1 who “self-disclosed immigration deportation proceedings”

Do you see the common thread here? “Self-disclosed.”

No one was caught trying to “hide something” on their application. And none of the self-disclosures were cause to deny the applicants a work card – which, again, was issued by LCSO, not the brothels.

In addition, none of this information was provided to the brothels. It’s all on the LCSO work card applications.

And yet, all of these self-disclosures were listed in the report as “Human Trafficking Indicators.”

“Indicators.” Like how the sniffles might be an “indicator” that you’re about to get the flu. Or not.

“Indicators” don’t mean the applicant is or was involved in human trafficking. Just that maybe a little deeper investigation into the applicant’s background by LCSO is called for.

Again, these were only “indicators” of POSSIBLE human sex trafficking; no actual human sex trafficking was found.

3.) As for including self-disclosed prior and open prostitution arrests, the LCSO report states these are “indicators” that the individuals “could still be controlled by a pimp.”

“Could.” Not “are.”

Here’s another possibility…

Maybe these sex workers – who have been working in the ILLEGAL sex market and were arrested for it – decided it was better for them to work in LEGAL brothels than on the street.

In fact, we’ve heard stories where JUDGES have actually ADVISED individuals caught engaging in the illegal market to go work in the legal brothels instead.

And what about sex workers working in the illegal market who are being physically or mentally abused by their illegal pimp? Wouldn’t it be understandable if they decided to escape such unsafe and abusive working conditions and instead move into a legal brothel?

Sure, previous experience as an illegal sex worker might be an indicator of human sex trafficking. But it could also be an indicator of someone logically and understandably deciding that working in a legal brothel is safer and less risky.

You simply cannot jump to the conclusion that all sex workers with a previous history in sex work are being “trafficked.”

So what have we learned, class?

First, never take newspaper headlines at face value.

Secondly, the actual screening “problem” has not been by the brothels.

Thirdly, maybe there are some possible examples of actual sex trafficking going on…or maybe not.

The good news and positive development in all of this is that Sheriff McNeil and the LCSO are now working in PARTNERSHIP with Lyon County’s legal brothels and legal sex workers to find solutions rather than working as adversaries.

The legal brothels don’t want sex trafficking any more than anyone else. They get thousands of applications from individuals who want to work legally every year. Willingly. Knowingly. Without coercion.

Together, the LCSO and the brothels are now working to update and refine the screening procedures for sex worker applicants that will better protect both the community and the workers themselves. This is a good thing.

The current system of legal brothels in Lyon County – which has been in place for almost 50 years – isn’t broken. It just needs a little modernization. You don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Prostitution will continue to exist in Lyon County with or without the licensed, regulated and taxed legal brothels. The legal system – while not perfect – is far better.

October 23, 2018 By NBA Staff

Sex workers make case for saving brothels as Lyon County voters weigh ban

Images from a forum opposing Lyon County Question 1 featuring legal sex workers Alice Little and Ruby Rae and campaign advisor to Dennis Hof, Chuck Muth, at the Bunny Ranch Restaurant in Mound House, Nev., east of Carson City on Thursday, Oct. 18, 2018. (David Calvert/The Nevada Independent)

(Michelle Rindells & Joey Lovato | Nevada Independent) – Workers from the Moonlite Bunny Ranch were just two days out from the death of Dennis Hof — the brash figurehead of legal prostitution in Nevada — when they took to a stage in Mound House to defend the existence of brothels.

At the first in a series of educational forums about a potential Lyon County brothel ban, there was a moment of silence for Hof, who died in his sleep just days after his 72nd birthday. He was a polarizing figure whose name will still appear as a Republican Assembly candidate on the November ballot, and one who raised the profile of brothels through an HBO reality show called “Cathouse” and a book called “The Art of the Pimp.”

“He took us from guilt and shame to glamour and fame. He made our brothels transparent,” said sex worker Air Force Amy, who has been in the industry for 28 years — most of them for Hof.

Some former brothel workers have publicly criticized the establishments for everything from a degrading environment to poor money-making prospects and a lack of resources for those seeking to leave. Hof was open about the fact that he had sex with many of the women who worked at his businesses, and some say that was not consensual or that the women felt pressured to have sex with him to advance their careers.

But current sex worker Alice Little remembered Hof as the person who gave her business advice and who helped her pick out a new car after her old one was totaled.

“He was such a visionary and he had such a passion for this industry, and anybody who knew him or was around him could feel it,” she said at the forum Thursday. “It just radiated from him and that’s why we’re here, to honor his legacy and to protect it, most importantly.”

Hof’s death leaves questions about the future of legal prostitution, especially in Lyon County, where all four brothels were owned by Hof. For now, control of the brothels has been transferred to the co-signers of the licenses, including longtime madam Suzette Cole. District Attorney Stephen Rye said his office is still reviewing whether there are any problems with such an ownership transfer and whether new license holders will have to go through a separate licensing proceeding.

It could mean a change in operations and in image for the brothels themselves. Hof was facing an ongoing sex assault investigation through the Nevada Department of Public Safety at the time of his death. Now, at least for the time being, the brothel will be run by a woman.

“Suzette taking over is the best possible outcome because she’s a woman and I love that. So she’s strong, she’s very independent, and I feel that’s very inspiring,” said Ruby Rae, one of the legal sex workers who defended the profession at the forum. “I think that we’re kind of… in this space in society where there’s a lot of things like #MeToo, so strong women in positions of power is really important.”

Hof’s former campaign adviser, Chuck Muth, moderated the forum (organizers said they invited brothel ban proponents but they did not accept the invitation). He posed arguments from the opposition to Little and Rae.

Here are excerpts from the conversation:

Will the ban make prostitution go away?

Lyon County voters are weighing in on an advisory question, which county commissioners can take into consideration later if they choose to enact a brothel ban. But Little was adamant that no ban could stop prostitution in general.

“Sex workers have been a part of society since the dawn of human time… and now we’re finally doing things the right way by legalizing it, regulating it, and making it beneficial to the community,” Little said. “If that’s taken away, sex work is not going to go away, but what will come back is all the problems associated with illegal prostitution and gone will be all the benefits of legal sex work and that would just be a real shame.”

Are comparisons between legal prostitution and human trafficking fair?

Brothel ban proponents have sought to draw a connection between legal prostitution and illegal prostitution, pointing to a study that shows illegal activity increases in places where legal activity is allowed.

But Little and Rae said they feel conflating the two is unfair to voters. Rae points out that she can continue pursuing her master’s degree at UNR “and this other job that I love;” she said the only exploitation she feels is from the opposition.

“We’re not trafficked. We are not forced. We’re here because we want to be, and I think that we are grown women who are able to make their own choices, and I just want to be supported in making my own decisions and my own choices,” Rae said.

She said she’ll eventually stop working at the brothel to move and pursue a Ph.D. Her ultimate goal is to become a professor at UNR, and she plans to teach courses for the next three semesters.

Little said she used to work as an EMT and as a jockey at a race track. Her family and friends know what she does for a living and are “incredibly, incredibly proud to support me in what I do.”

“Is my life so terrible? I’ve got two dogs, a couple of cats. I’ve got a couple ponies and a mini pig that has her own bedroom because she’s really spoiled,” Little said. “I am really not being exploited. I chose to come here, and I choose to stay here. I make a choice every single day when I go to work, when I go to the doctor, when I show up for my appointments. All of those are choices that I am able to make with my own volition and freedom.”

‘No Little Girl’ campaign

Proponents of a brothel ban have launched a campaign under the slogan “No Little Girl” — implying that no little girl grows up wishing to be a prostitute someday.

The brothel workers pushed back on the idea, which they called “gross.” They said they made the decision to enter sex work as full-grown women.

“The whole girl thing — I’m not a girl, I’m woman,” Rae said. “And when you kind of say like no little girl grows up wanting to be a prostitute, I mean, yeah — you’re probably right. I didn’t know what I wanted to be. I thought unicorns were real and the tooth fairy really existed.”

Little added that sex work was less demanding on the body than other professions such as mining, and she said she enjoys the flexibility she has in her work life.

“I have the ability to give myself a raise by choosing to extend my clientele basis. I have the ability to give myself a vacation whenever I so want,” she said. “No little girl wants to grow up without having freedom and control over her own scheduling. I got to grow up to have complete control over my life and that’s a privilege and it’s one that I plan to defend.”

They also chafed at the idea that all women who go into brothels are coming from abusive situations, saying the notion is one of the ways sex workers are “oppressed” by stigma.

“The stereotype of the sex worker that comes from a broken home or from a bad childhood or rough upbringing, that all comes from stigma,” Rae said. “Not all of us come from that and even if some of us do, that shouldn’t be something that takes away our choice to do the job, because some women do find it empowering and a way to cope with trauma.”

Will eliminating brothels save Lyon County money?

Brothels in Lyon County bring several hundred thousand dollars in licensing revenue each year. But it also costs money for the sheriff to screen applicants, issue work cards and monitor the brothels for compliance.

The Lyon County sheriff’s office recommended county commissioners add extra personnel and buy new equipment so they can better screen applicants who might be subject to human trafficking or part of a criminal enterprise.

Little argued that eliminating the brothels would not save money.

“They instead would have to instill a new vice squad to handle all the illegal prostitution flowing into the county because we no longer have the legal system preventing it,” she said. “Can you imagine how much that’s going to cost, $500,000, $600,000 plus easily. Not to mention the fact that there’s going to be a tremendous loss of all the taxation in this county.”

Are legal prostitutes victims?

Proponents of the brothel ban have pushed the idea that women in brothels are being sold — most notably through an advertising campaign that portrays the women curled up in a fetal position and shrink-wrapped like meat.

“I think that they want to push victimhood on us and make us believe that we’re victims because it fits their narrative and their agenda, but what they don’t understand is when you do have strong women who feel empowered by their jobs, that means that we’re not going to give into that,” Rae said. “I feel like they’re kind of using me as a pawn actually, but I do feel like they’re trying to just maneuver whichever way they can into making girls feel like we should be ashamed of doing this.”

She said the only way she feels like a victim is on the point that she might lose her job if the brothels shut down.

“I am very strong and independent and I don’t need any man to do anything for me, which is why I love this job,” Rae said. “It really allows me financially and everything else to really pursue my degrees and my passions and not have to rely on a man or not even have to think about getting married or anything like that.”

Little said she and other sex workers have the freedom to be in relationships or not.

“What’s so particularly unique about our industry is that it’s one of the very few in which women are more financially successful than men,” she said. “They’re the one who’s bringing home the bacon as one would say and it’s a very different narrative, and frankly, it’s a very positive feminist and modern narrative that I think is important to protect.”

She also pushed back against the idea that sex workers are selling themselves. They’re only selling a service, they said.

“We are caretakers for society, fulfilling the need, the very, very real need for intimacy, companionship, sex education,” Little said. “One of the benefits of seeing a legal sex worker is not to buy a legal sex worker, because we’re not up for sale. No amount of money could purchase me or any one of my coworkers. That’s not what this is about.”

Is legal prostitution stifling economic growth?

*The Moonlite Bunny Ranch in Mound House, Nev., east of Carson City on Thursday, Oct. 18, 2018. (David Calvert/The Nevada Independent)*

The women argued that Northern Nevada’s rapid growth — especially that of brothel owner Lance Gilman’s Tahoe Reno Industrial Center (TRIC) — is proof that brothels aren’t bad for business.

“I mean look at the Mustang Ranch, Tesla. Business are not not coming here because of the brothels,” Rae said. “I think the number one reason, what you and I read, was sewer or water or something like that, utilities, so it has nothing to do with the brothels. They’re just trying to pin it on that to further their agenda.”

Are prostitutes prevented from leaving the premises?

Little said some counties have what’s referred to as a lockdown policy, in which women arrive for the beginning of their “tour” and are not allowed to leave until the end of the tour. But she said Lyon County brothels afford sex workers more freedom than anywhere else.

“Dennis was very adamant about us being able to have freedom and to be able to leave and live our lives outside of the brothel, and that was very important and that’s very important to me. I would have never chosen to work somewhere where I couldn’t do that,” said Rae, who added that she needed the freedom to pursue her degrees.

Rae also said she can refuse clients and rejected an appointment earlier that week because she didn’t like something a prospective client said to her.

“We have the ability to set our own schedules. We have the ability to market ourselves the way that we choose. We have the ability to show or hide our faces publicly as we want,” she said. “We have 100 percent complete control over our own businesses. That’s what we are, independent contractors, business professionals within a business.”

Is being a legal prostitute safe?

Little and Rae pointed to a number of factors designed to keep sex workers safe.

Customers to the Bunny Ranch must be buzzed in through a gate, will have their ID checked and then have their bags checked upon arrival.

Visitors who are disrespectful during the “lineup” — when prostitutes line up so a potential client can choose their favorite — will be asked to leave, the women said.

There are also panic buttons in the rooms, although Hof was subject to a lawsuit from one prostitute who said the buttons were not working at the time of an alleged assault in 2003.

“All of these things, these legal protections, are in place for a reason. They prevent folks that have ill intentions from even seeking them in the first place,” Little said. “As a result, we have some of the most amazing human beings from around the globe visiting us here.”

The precautions of the legal system also help the client, they said.

“There’s always going to be men who are wanting to purchase the services of a sex worker. That’s never going to go away, so safety for them is coming to the Bunny Ranch and other legal brothels because we are tested weekly,” Rae said. “If you go to a bar and you’re picking up somebody from there and you don’t use protection or whatever, that is so much less safe.”

Who are the clients?

Rae said some of her clients have disabilities or want her to teach them new things.

“I have a lot of men who just are very inexperienced or virgins. They just have not had a lot of sexual experience in their lives thus far and they are embarrassed by that, and they feel some type of shame, even,” Rae said. “They want to be validated and understood and that’s really important, and I wouldn’t want to see that taken away from them because it really fills a void in a space and it serves a purpose.”

Little said her clients range in age from their 20s to their 70s, and include couples and people from all walks of life.

“A lot of our time spent with our guests is getting to know them, having these amazingly intellectual conversations over dinner where we’re sharing thoughts and feelings and ideas, where I’m getting to know them and they’re getting to know me, too,” she said.

What happens if the ban passes?

Even if Lyon County’s Question 1 passes, it’s only an advisory measure and would not ban brothels unless commissioners took action. Little said that if the ban passes, she expects lengthy litigation all the way up to the Supreme Court.

“Personally, if the brothels were to close, I’m going to chain myself to that front gate,” she said. “Good luck getting me out of that place. I’m staying.”

Muth said it’s important for the advisory question to not just be defeated, but to be “crushed” because of efforts to enact a statewide ban that are percolating in the Legislature.

“Senator Joe Hardy has already introduced a bill to ban prostitution statewide and if it passes here in Lyon County, it’s only going to embolden them to pass a statewide ban,” he said.

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October 23, 2018 By NBA Staff

Dennis Hof: Showman and sex industry modernizer

(Barbara Brents) – Dennis Hof was a showman who capitalized on the caricature bestowed by his business – the world’s greatest pimp. He would love the attention his death is getting.

But let’s not confuse his flamboyant thorn-in-your side image with what he actually did for the state: brought Nevada’s legal brothels into the modern sexual economy.

Yes, there is a sexual economy. The travel and entertainment industries would not be the world’s largest employers without the selling and buying of sex and sexuality. Yes, there is a seedy, even dangerous side. But the seedy side is a shrinking part of a multi-billion-dollar industry. The same way gambling has become sanitized, so too has sex. And Nevada is at the cutting edge, thanks in large part to Hof.

For all else he was or wasn’t, Hof was a businessman who grew his business because he treated it like a business. A key part of that was respecting the sex workers far more than had been common practice in years past in Nevada’s brothels.

Dennis Hof first took over the Moonlite Bunny Ranch in 1992, when Joe Conforte (remember him?) lost his even more infamous Mustang Ranch and fled to Brazil to escape money laundering and tax evasion charges.

Joe Richards, later convicted of attempting to bribe a Nye County commissioner, was the Southern Nevada brothel kingpin at that time. He had a reputation of running a rough brothel for women and getting favors from the Nye County Commission. Hof bought two of his brothels in 2010.

Back then, local governments were just beginning to modernize their business codes to deal with brothels (and prevent shysters like Conforte from returning, sort of like how we got rid of the mob in gambling). There were good and bad owners and managers, but policies like regularly searching them and holding their possessions, strict curfews, limiting phone use and three-week mandatory contracts were common. Brothel owners were just wrapping their heads around independent contractor rules. Many brothels were nothing more than old trailers with even older furniture, appealing to working-class truckers and miners and the occasional politician.

When our research team was interviewing owners in the late 1990s, Hof was the only one who talked first and foremost about the women’s rights. Like other owners, he made clear that his workers could turn down any customer any time, but he also trained them how to say no. He provided incentives rather than fines, taught sales techniques from other businesses. All this, he said in a 2000 interview, “creates a much better environment, because what you end up with is a willing buyer, a willing seller, and a good party — and the basis for a repeat customer.”

Hof used to refer to owners such as Conforte and Richards as “old school, hardcore prostitution.” He chastised them for having sex with their workers. (As Hof bought more brothels, his attitude toward sex with the workers changed, unfortunately. I suspect that with fewer choices among owners, it was harder for workers to report abuses.)

Since then, more brothels have modernized, putting in spas, tanning beds, exercise equipment and upgrading the kitchen staff. More brothels allow women to go home after their shifts. Owners have to treat the workers better in order to compete. Most owners still shun the high profile Hof maintained, but he did make treating the women better a more common priority.

There are lots of ways the brothels can still be improved, but much of the policy discussion thus far has missed one important point. There are some very smart, very powerful, very angry female workers and managers who don’t want to lose their jobs.

We should enlist the occasion of Hof’s departure to further modernize brothel codes and refine work card oversight, taking lessons from all the other countries in the world that oversee brothels and other independent sex workers.

Let’s give employees and independent contractors the right to report sexual harassment or assault charges in a way that gives everyone a fair hearing. Let’s remove the unfair curfews placed on sex workers in some counties, end policies that control workers’ presence in town while on contract with the brothels and create mechanisms so workers can report abuses of independent contractor laws. Let’s use some of the same techniques we used to clean up gambling and make the sex industry a better, safer and less exploitative place for workers.

And who knows better how to do this than the brothel workers themselves? Let’s treat the sex workers with the respect they deserve and let them help write the policy that affects their lives.

Barbara G. Brents, Ph.D, is a sociology professor at UNLV. She is co-author of “The State of Sex: Tourism Sex and Sin in the New American Heartland” on Nevada’s brothel industry. This column was originally published by the Nevada Independent on October 23, 2018.

October 10, 2018 By NBA Staff

Legal Sex Workers Say: If We Want to Be “Saved” We’ll Call You – We’re Not Victims, Leave Us Alone!

(By Ruby Rae) – Recently the Reno Gazette-Journal ran an op-ed written by a Texas woman named Rebekah Charleston who made a number of absolutely outrageous claims about Lyon County’s legal brothels that, as a legal sex worker, I can’t let go unanswered.

Ms. Charleston, who’s been on a crusade to “save” sex workers for years now, claims she’s a “survivor who was once trafficked into Nevada’s legal brothels.”

But her story – as with the entire campaign to ban brothels in Lyon County – is loaded with misinformation and outright lies.

First, she claims to have worked at both the Bunny Ranch and Love Ranch where – because the industry is so tightly regulated and controlled via sheriff-issued work cards – the brothels are required to maintain extensive employment records.

And guess what?

Neither the general manager nor the accountant at the ranches has been able to find any record of Rebekah Charleston ever working there…and not one supposed co-worker or customer remembers her.

Of course, it would be extremely helpful to know exactly when Ms. Charleston claims to have worked in Lyon County – a detail she conveniently omitted in her column.

Why is this important?

Because if she claims to have worked there after she got out of prison in 2007, she must have lied about her felony criminal record or used a fake name and ID in order to obtain a work card from the sheriff.

And if she’d lie about that, what else would she lie about?

In fact, what it appears Ms. Charleston is deceptively doing is taking her experience working as a prostitute in an illegal brothel in Texas in the early 2000’s and using that to smear Lyon County’s legal brothels.

*Charleston’s illegal Texas brothel: “Prostitution rings in the suburbs are a growing trend”*

According to a CBS11 I-Team report back in January, Charleston was arrested “for money laundering and tax evasion” as part of a “high-dollar prostitution ring” operated out of “a very unlikely place – an upscale Denton home” in a Dallas suburb where she lived with her pimp.

This is important to point out because Lyon County residents need to understand that if you ban our legal brothels, that won’t make prostitution go away.

Illegal brothels will simply spring up in your neighborhoods rather than be confined to out-of-the-way industrial parks.

*Rebekah Charleston’s neighborhood “money laundering” pizza shop*

The money laundering and tax evasion for which Ms. Charleston went to prison involved a pizza restaurant she co-owned “to disguise the money” she was making illegally as an illegal prostitute working in an illegal brothel operated illegally out of a luxury home in Texas – not Nevada.

In the I-Team report, Ms. Charleston details the horrific abuse she suffered at the hands of the violent street pimp she worked for.

“If you didn’t obey the rules, you’d be beaten,” she said.

But that’s why so many of us have CHOSEN to work in a legal brothel. That kind of abuse simply doesn’t happen here. We’re safe.

And because we’re working legally, *if* anything even close to what Ms. Charleston is claiming ever happened, we wouldn’t be afraid of getting arrested if we reported it to law enforcement authorities.

Ms. Charleston also claims that Lyon County’s legal sex workers don’t have the freedom “to turn down buyers,” and that when a customer came in and picked her, “we would bring the sex buyer back to our room where he was allowed to do whatever he wanted with us.”

“This is simply untrue,” writes sex worker Ruby Rose of Sheri’s brothel in response. “We always have the freedom to turn away clients at any time and for any reason.

“When a sex worker goes back to her room with a client who chooses her in a lineup, it’s to negotiate price and activity, not to let him do whatever he wants.”

“Absolutely FALSE,” adds sex worker Kourtney Chase of the Love Ranch. “I can turn down anyone I want. Listen to the ladies who actually work at the brothels and have experienced it first-hand!!”

“She lying straight through her teeth,” legal sex worker Kiki Lover of the Kit Kat Ranch stated plainly.

The fact is, in the legal brothels we have the choice – always – to say which clients we will say yes and no to. We also have staff that would never let a man hurt us, and we have a clientele that do not come here to hurt us. Period.

Ms. Charleston also claims women working in Lyon County’s brothels “were not able to come and go as they pleased.”

This is another outright lie.

“We make our own hours, time off and much more,” writes legal sex worker Destiny Starr of the Love Ranch. “We are not held as hostages.”

“The Lyon County brothels are NOT lock-down brothels,” adds Christina Parreira, a legal sex worker and PhD student at UNLV who’s writing her doctoral thesis on her experience working in Nevada’s legal brothels, “and that’s easy for anyone to verify.

“Workers leave all the time. ALL THE TIME. The Lyon County brothels have NEVER run on a lock-down system.”

And I can attest to that personally myself. I leave on a regular basis to attend classes at UNR while pursuing my Master’s degree.

Now, as to the overall claim by Ms. Charleston that sex trafficking occurs in Lyon County, Christina says that’s also absolutely untrue.

“Sex trafficking is a problem, but it’s not a problem occurring in legal Nevada brothels,” she writes. “In the past four years of deep ethnographic research into the Nevada brothels – including working/living there and over 60 interviews with other sex workers – I found zero evidence of sex trafficking.

“Zero. None. Nada. It’s not happening. I don’t know how to be any clearer.”

“Consenting adults are not victims of trafficking,” adds Kourtney. “Legal sex workers are simply doing it as a job and we should have the right to choose sex work as our career.”

“The anti-brothel movement claims to want to protect and liberate legal sex workers under the assumption that we are helpless, trafficked by pimps and participating in the adult industry against our will,” writes Alice Little, a legal sex worker at the Bunny Ranch brothel.

“It’s illegal sex work that exploits children,” Alice continues. “It’s illegal sex work that traffics. It’s illegal sex work that sees women exploited and abused by pimps.

“The legal system people such as Ms. Charleston are attacking actually creates a safe haven from the dangers of the illegal industry. The idea that you’re advocating for the ‘rights’ of women by taking away their right to work is irony that borders on deranged.”

But in conclusion, I think Destiny put it best: “We are regular workers and we are regular people. We pay taxes, mortgages and much more. We are not victims. Leave us alone.”

Sound advice. Live and let live.

(Ruby Rae has lived in Nevada for 15 years with her parents, grandparents and siblings. She has worked in a brothel for seven years and is now an M.A. student at UNR.)

October 8, 2018 By NBA Staff

Um, About the “Fake News” Feeding Frenzy over ICE’s “Brothel Raid”

(Chuck Muth) – No, ICE didn’t “raid” the world-famous Bunny Ranch brothels. Here’s the real story…

If you believe the “fake news” media you’d have come to believe that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, along with deputies from the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office, conducted an immigration “raid” on Lyon County’s four legal brothels last week and found illegal immigrants working there and “sex trafficking” going on.

Here’s a spattering of the breathless headlines…

“Immigration violations, possible sex trafficking found at Nevada brothels” – Reuters

“Dennis Hof is investigated for human trafficking and immigration violations at his three legal brothels” – Daily Mail

Possible immigration violations found at Mound House brothels” – Mason Valley News

“Nevada Brothels Run by Dennis Hof under investigation for immigration violations, possibly sex trafficking – New York Daily News

“LCSO Finds Brothel Work Cards in Violation of US Immigration Law” – KTNV News 2

The KTNV story started out thusly…

“The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office reports they conducted a series of brothel work card compliance checks of prostitutes with the assistance of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.

“They said the prostitutes who obtained work cards were contrary to Lyon County Code and in possible violation of U.S. immigration law for the Mound House brothels, Bunny Ranch, Kit Kat Ranch and Love Ranch.”

The Mason Valley News started out like this…

“Prostitutes at Bunny Ranch, Kit Kat Ranch and the Love Ranch North were inspected for possible violation of United States immigration laws during an Oct. 3 work card compliance check. During the check, 19 expired work cards were discovered, as well as possible acts of human trafficking.”

Sounds pretty bad, right? Keep reading…

The misleading headlines had anti-legal brothel crusaders foaming at the mouth. Assemblywoman Jill Tolles got herself all worked up in a lather and tweeted a link to the KTNV story with the following…

“The four-month long investigation found… U.S. immigration law violations, foreign country human trafficking indicators…”

So many things to be proud of in our State… this is not one of them. #WeDeserveBetter

Added Dylan Shaver, vice president of the Nevada Mining Association…

“Thank you, Assemblywoman, for speaking up against this tarnish on the Silver State.”

It takes a lot of brass for the spokesperson of an industry that’s been raping our land and natural resources to claim someone else is “tarnishing” our state. But…whatever.

As you can see, the headlines, reporting, and social media rants all would have you believe the BROTHELS have been doing something wrong and got caught in an ICE “raid.”

Total bat guano.

Let’s start with an easy one; the claim that “19 expired work cards were discovered.”

That’s possible. But it’s meaningless – since none of the individuals were still working there. That’s like having an expired credit card being “discovered” in your wallet.

Next, the most outrageous: Assemblywoman Tolles’ selective editing of the KTNV report.

She left out the part about this being a four-month investigation of registration procedures and practices followed by the sheriff’s office in issuing work cards, not the brothels.

Repeat…

BROTHELS DON’T ISSUE WORK CARDS!

The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office does.

It is the responsibility of sheriff’s office to do background checks on anyone wishing to work in one of Nevada’s legal brothels, not the brothels. And the brothels don’t let anyone work there unless they have a work card issued by THE SHERIFF’S OFFICE.

What her highness Assemblywoman Tolles did – to advance her anti-brothel agenda – was dishonest and disgraceful. Her selectively-edited tweet was written and sent either out of malice or ignorance. Either way, it does not reflect well on an elected official.

If she has any honor she’ll delete the tweet and issue an official, public apology.

Don’t hold your breath waiting.

Now back to the main story…

Fortunately, one reporter – Michelle Rindels of the Nevada Independent – actually got the facts correct rather than going for the easy click-bait headline…

Immigration agents, deputies visit Lyon County brothels for compliance checks; sheriff says county regulation ‘inadequate’

And here’s her tweet linking to the article…

Immigration agents join sheriff’s personnel on ‘educational’ visits to Lyon County brothels; no citations or arrests

And here’s her opening paragraph…

“Lyon County sheriff’s officials said Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents joined them on unannounced visits to the county’s legal brothels on Wednesday afternoon, but the stops were educational and did not lead to arrests or citations.”

An “educational” visit, not a “raid.”

But wait, there’s more…

As Rindels notes, the four-month “investigation” was not on the brothels, but an “internal audit” of the SHERIFF’S OFFICE itself…

“Michael Carlson, administrative director for the Lyon County sheriff’s office, said the agency has been internally auditing its procedures and has realized it wasn’t following its brothel registration policies to the letter. The Wednesday visit was ‘used as teaching lesson’ for sheriff’s officials, ICE agents and brothel workers to better understand the ordinance and immigration laws.”

The unannounced compliance check – which is normal and customary and happens on a regular basis – allegedly found three workers – out of more than 500 – working at the brothels who were in the country illegally.

Alas, one was later verified as a U.S. citizen, one had already left the country, and the third no longer even worked at the brothel.

So much for that.

In any event – and this is the key point – all had work cards issued by the SHERIFF’S OFFICE. The SHERIFF’S OFFICE issued the work cards, not the brothels.

So as far as the brothels knew, all three were in the country legally since the sheriff’s office had completed its background check on them and issued them work cards.

In fact, as Rindels noted, “sheriff’s officials characterized the problems as deficiencies in Lyon County regulation of brothels rather than willful violations from the brothels themselves.”

In addition, Sheriff Al McNeil plainly stated: “I do want to add that we do not believe [brothel owner Dennis] Hof or any of his staff are knowingly engaged in international human trafficking.”

And yet the click-baiters felt free to post “fake news” headlines such as “Dennis Hof is investigated for human trafficking and immigration violations at his three legal brothels.”

Let’s keep going…

“Prostitutes at the brothels are considered independent contractors,” Rindels reported, adding that “the law does prevent businesses from contracting with an independent contractor if they know that person is not authorized to work legally in the country.”

But the brothels don’t know that!

All they know is that the contractors had their backgrounds checked by the SHERIFF’S OFFICE and were issued a work card by the SHERIFF’S OFFICE saying they were legally eligible to work in the county.

Indeed…

“The sheriff’s office regularly conducts ‘compliance checks’ to ensure that prostitutes are properly registered with the county and have valid ‘work cards’ issued by the sheriff allowing them to work in a legal brothel. Having ICE agents along was meant to help sheriff’s officials know what they were looking at when examining green cards and brief them on relevant federal law and was a first for the agency.”

So as you can see, this entire matter was about the SHERIFF’S OFFICE and the processes and procedures IT’S following before issuing work cards, not the brothels.

That’s not my assessment; that’s what Sheriff McNeil himself told Lyon County commissioners last week…

In his report, McNeil noted that the internal investigation of the sheriff’s office uncovered “issuance of work cards prior to completing criminal history background checks” and blamed “clerical staff processing these applications who do not have the required knowledge and skills to conduct the mandated background checks.”

That’s a sheriff’s office failure, not the brothels.

But you wouldn’t know that in reading news stories and social media posts other than Ms. Rindels’.

So, what’s this really all about? Money.

Sheriff McNeil is using the “international human trafficking” hot-button to solicit more tax dollars for his department. He said so himself…

“It is projected that a qualified and trained full-time clerk needs to replace the part-time Dayton clerk to process all applications, and our Investigations Bureau will need to be initially increased by one detective to become part of a regional sex trafficking task force on a ½ time basis until more work load data is obtained in order to determine if the position warrants a full-time work-load.”

But as Frank Hunewill, Sheriff McNeil’s opponent in the upcoming general election, put it in a debate back in August: “There’s always a way to fix something without throwing money at it.”

So it seems the common-sense solution to these problems isn’t to unfairly and wrongly “tarnish” and scapegoat Lyon County’s legal brothels…but to elect a new sheriff.

(Mr. Muth is president of CitizenOutreach.org and publisher of NevadaNewsandViews.com. He blogs at MuthsTruths.com. His views are his own.)

October 7, 2018 By NBA Staff

Banning rural Nevada brothels would exacerbate problems

(Barbara G. Brent and Sarah J. Blithe) – Scholars at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and the University of Nevada, Reno have been conducting ethically approved and methodologically rigorous research in the legal brothels in Lyon and other Nevada counties for more than 20 years. The women studied have repeatedly reported that they feel safer working in brothels, that they provide an important human service, that they work only with clients they choose and that the income from legal sex work is often better than their work in other jobs.

For years we have been presenting research at national and international conferences, and Nevada is held up as a positive model for regulating prostitution. It’s approach — though it certainly can be improved — is seen by scholars from around the globe as a far better alternative for the health, safety and rights of the individuals in it than criminalizing prostitution.

Lyon County citizens are now being asked to return to a system that criminalizes prostitution. The evidence is clear that criminalizing prostitution may deter a few individuals. But our research suggests that when prostitution is criminalized, sex workers are less safe and too scared of being penalized to report crimes to the police. Indeed, the evidence has been so compelling on the abuses in criminalized systems that social justice organizations — including Amnesty International, the United Nations, the World Health Organization and health professionals in the British Medical Journal and The Lancet — have recommended decriminalization, including eliminating those laws that prohibit associated activities such as bans on buying, solicitation and general organization of sex work.

In New Zealand, where prostitution is not a crime and brothels are regulated, bad behavior by brothel owners is subject to disciplinary action, and one brothel worker won a sexual harassment case against her employer.

Laws on sex work should focus on protecting people from exploitation and abuse, rather than trying to ban all sex work. If we care about the women working in legal brothels, we suggest the following: 1) clarify health and safety laws; 2) allow all workers to leave the brothels daily, if desired, after their shifts; 3) remove unfair curfews placed on sex workers in some counties; 4) end any policies that control workers’ presence in town while on contract with the brothels; 5) create mechanisms so that workers can report abuses of independent contractor laws.

Let’s make Nevada brothels better for the women working there. And let’s bring the workers into the debate on how we can proceed.

Barbara G. Brents is a professor in the department of sociology at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She is a co-author of “The State of Sex: Tourism, Sex and Sin in the New American Heartland.” Sarah J. Blithe is an associate professor in communication studies at the University of Nevada, Reno. She is co-author of “Sex and Stigma: Stories of Everyday Life in Nevada’s Legal Brothels,” coming January. This column was originally published in the Las Vegas Review-Journal on October 7, 2018