Outreach workers and advocates have expressed strong frustration after a recent Victoria Police operation targeting sex workers to gather evidence of human trafficking. Victoria Police’s Special Victims Unit recently conducted a sting on leolist which has since raised serious concerns among support organizations and workers’ rights advocates.

In this operation, officers posed as clients on escort advertising websites to arrange meetings with sex workers, luring them to a hotel room under the guise of being potential clients. When each worker arrived, she was questioned by a plainclothes officer and a social worker on possible experiences of trafficking or exploitation. Officers spoke to eight women, the youngest of whom was 18.

Rachel Phillips, executive director of PEERS Victoria Resources Society, a local organization offering support to sex workers, strongly condemned the approach, which she says only further alienates and marginalizes sex workers by equating consensual adult work with trafficking.

“We’re deeply disappointed and don’t understand why they would take this approach,” said Phillips, noting that police did not consult PEERS before initiating the operation.

The method of creating false identities to gain trust online is often referred to as “catfishing” and is a tactic commonly used by police to catch sexual predators or individuals sharing exploitative images. According to Phillips, this tactic is largely ineffective in genuinely identifying and supporting victims of human trafficking. She emphasized that such ambush tactics create fear among sex workers and erode trust in the police—a trust that could be crucial if a worker needed police support.

“These tactics scare sex workers and damage their trust in police,” Phillips added. “In the end, this approach is both futile and harmful.”

Additionally, Phillips criticized the operation for further harming workers’ livelihoods. Many sex workers have already faced financial strain due to the pandemic, and a sting operation like this impacts their ability to earn money safely.

Victoria Police Constable Cam MacIntyre responded to these criticisms, noting that all participants were immediately informed they were free to leave and were under no obligation to speak with police. According to MacIntyre, most of the women stayed and engaged in conversation, during which officers provided information about support services and distributed care packages with toiletries, clothing, and gift cards for essentials.

On the first day of the operation, officers reportedly identified one woman who had been transported to the hotel by a known trafficker with a record of criminal convictions for trafficking offenses, according to MacIntyre. Based on these interactions, police said they believe multiple women they encountered may have been victims of trafficking.

MacIntyre acknowledged that human trafficking cases are typically underreported, largely due to the strong control traffickers have over their victims. He pointed out that many trafficking victims face intense physical and psychological control, making it difficult for them to seek help independently or access outreach services.

The operation utilized the website LeoList, a classified advertising site popular among sex workers that accepts payment through cryptocurrency and helps people find escorts in Canada that they can meetup with for incall or outcall service.

Chivarella expressed concern that characteristics such as being young or traveling between cities are often misinterpreted as signs of trafficking. She explained that such assumptions ignore the complexities of sex work, noting that people often enter sex work as a means to cope with challenging situations, rather than as a sign of exploitation.

Victoria Police did not provide specific information on whether the operation conclusively identified any trafficking victims but warned the public about the presence of human trafficking in Victoria. Police noted that some of the women encountered were from other cities, like Montreal and Toronto, a pattern commonly associated with individuals who travel to major cities in Canada for work.

Phillips believes that police are overstating the prevalence of human trafficking in Victoria. Based on her six years of experience with PEERS, during which she has worked with hundreds of sex workers, she has spoken with only five individuals who described experiences resembling trafficking.

In a similar instance in 2017, the RCMP defended a national operation that involved questioning sex workers in hotel rooms across seven provinces. That effort involved 57 police agencies, leading to 14 arrests and the removal of six individuals from allegedly exploitative situations, including two minors.

Four individuals from Vancouver Island were arrested in Saskatchewan on trafficking-related charges in early 2021, highlighting that trafficking does indeed affect Canadian communities.

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