Hydee Feldstein Soto, Los Angeles’ first female city attorney and the first Latina elected citywide, is leading “a movement to protect our girls.”
In 2021, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received more than 17,200 reports of child sex trafficking from all 50 U.S. states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. When Hydee Feldstein Soto was elected city attorney of Los Angeles in November 2022, she knew immediately that she would make fighting child sex trafficking a priority.
Born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Feldstein Soto attended Swarthmore College and Columbia University Law School. She now supervises a team of 1,000 legal professionals, including 550 attorneys who carry out Los Angeles’ legal work at her direction and under her supervision.
Ms. spoke with Feldstein Soto about how she has worked to reduce child sex trafficking in Los Angeles.
Carrie Baker: What brought your attention to the issue of child sex trafficking?
Feldstein Soto: When I was campaigning, a detective took me on a ride along late at night to South Figueroa Street. There were hundreds of what appeared to be young women in various stages of undress thronging on street corners with cars lined up waiting for services. I was really taken aback. I thought I knew LA. I had never seen anything like that.
After I came into office, the incoming Los Angeles City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, in whose district most of Figueroa Street lies, invited the mayor and me to go on a ride along with him. This one was in broad daylight and there wasn’t much difference. What caught my eye in daylight that I hadn’t seen at night was that this was in the middle of a working-families community. There were parents and kids trying to get through this to go about their lives.
I left that day and put together a roadmap of what to do. My mission statement was to disrupt the sex trafficking along the south Figueroa quarter by creating a multi-agency multidisciplinary task force focused on recovering the victims, shutting down the motels, arresting the predators and profiteers, and disrupting the johns.
Believe it or not, solicitation of a minor for the purposes of prostitution is a misdemeanor. It is not a felony.
LA City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto
Baker: You said these women looked young. Were they minors?
Feldstein Soto: Yes.
Last year, our law enforcement partners rescued 60 minors. The youngest was 12. Consistent with the county protocol, they were delivered into the hands of family or service providers.
We work with several services providers who provide housing, counseling, et cetera—including Journey Out, The Teen Project, SistahFriends and Children of the Night. Ideally, we try to prevent them from being revictimized and preyed upon. Once a child has been victimized, it becomes easier to use fraud or coercion to take these young girls back into a life of trafficking.
Of the 60 or so minors that we rescued last year, 96 percent of them were either African American or Latino: 70 percent African American, 26 percent Latina. That is not reflected in the adult sex worker population, where the demographics are much more evenly distributed.
When you look at the demographics of the johns and the pimps, the men that we’ve cited or arrested, 50 to 55 percent are Latino; that matches the percentage in the population. Twenty-eight to 30 percent are Caucasian; that also matches their percentage in the population, although it’s much higher than their percentage in the surrounding community. Guys come down from the Hollywood Hills or come in from out of town.
We’ve continued the effort this year. Through May, through our collaboration with the LAPD, at least 71 underaged girls have been rescued. So, we are on track to double or better what we did last year in terms of rescues.
Once a child has been victimized, it becomes easier to use fraud or coercion to take these young girls back into a life of trafficking.
Hydee Feldstein Soto
Baker: What do you do about the men buying sex from girls?
Feldstein Soto: We have teams that capture photos of drivers who appear to interact with sex workers. The LAPD sends Dear John letters to the registered owners of the vehicles, saying, “We don’t know if you realized it, but your automobile has been seen in an area that is known for the trafficking of minors and you may want to be careful.”
Eight-hundred Dear John letters were sent between July 2023 and May 2024. It’s a very effective tactic. We have received queries from registered vehicle owners, their significant others and even have anecdotal information that the letters have had a positive impact.
Baker: Do they realize the girls are under 18?
Feldstein Soto: They either don’t realize that the child is under 18 or they don’t care. The taste for young flesh is an obsession and without the consequences, it’s very difficult to overcome the craving, the desire to go back for more. And so, interrupting the demand is important.
Baker: Have you arrested men for buying sex from minors?
Feldstein Soto: Because of this collaboration with the LAPD, over 100 of the customers have been arrested and cited. That can be embarrassing.
We have prosecuted individuals when there was sufficient evidence to pursue a criminal case. In one such case, the age disparity was so great that we were able to really hold the potential sex buyer accountable. My misdemeanor jurisdiction is 364 days. We brought multiple charges and got guilty verdicts on all counts. The court required the defendant to register as a sex offender as part of his criminal sentence.
Baker: Do you prosecute men buying sex from adult women?
Feldstein Soto: What consenting adults do behind closed doors without involving a minor is not a priority for our office. There’s a law against prostitution. I’m not nullifying the law, but my office, like so many others, has limited resources to address multiple issues, and so adult sex work is not a priority.
When there is sufficient evidence to prosecute a criminal case against a man soliciting sexual acts in this working-class neighborhood, then my office will consider prosecuting the case. In some cases where a prosecution may not be advisable, then we have community justice programs that the person may be eligible to participate in lieu of prosecution.
Baker: Are you prosecuting the pimps?
Feldstein Soto: Multiple arrests have been made of what I call apex predators—pimps who are violent, running multiple operations, coercive, et cetera. These cases were referred to the district attorney and United States attorney, who have jurisdiction over felonies and prosecutorial discretion to pursue them and hold these predators accountable.
Baker: What else have you done to fight sexual exploitation of minors?
Feldstein Soto: We’ve addressed the locations. We went out to the motels to enforce the city’s law that you cannot operate a nuisance establishment used for prostitution or other criminal purposes or a place where prostitution acts are held or occur. What we are seeking to do is to bring the motels into compliance to stop the illegal activity. We give them lots of opportunities. We send them warning letters. We hold case conferences with motel owners/operators. We say, please come in. They either comply or they don’t.
Last year in August after our first sweep, we filed our first publicized nuisance abatement suit against the New Gage Motel. The motel owners then sued the city, but that lawsuit was dismissed. Our nuisance abatement lawsuit is currently being litigated.
In the last year, a total of two motels were ordered closed following public hearings through the city’s administrative nuisance process, which is different from the judicial or court route.
Two other motels were not closed but had conditions (like requiring security and prohibiting hourly room rentals) imposed through that administrative process, and we have several others under investigation.
Baker: You have also advocated for stronger laws. Can you tell me about that?
Feldstein Soto: I took a bunch of bills to Sacramento. Just one is left, SB 1128, introduced by Senator Anthony Portantino and co-authored by Senators Susan Rubio and Blanca Rubio on the Assembly side. It’s a sex offender registry bill. Every sex crime against a minor carries mandatory registration in California except for one. I call it the “Jeffrey Epstein exception.” Sexual intercourse between an adult male and a 14- to 17-year-old girl is not among the list of registrable offenses in the state of California, no matter how big the age gap is between them.
I’m furious about this exclusion. Oral copulation with a minor is registrable if the offender is at least 10 years older than the minor. Anal copulation with a minor is registrable if there’s at least a 10-year age difference. Penetration with an object other than a penis is registrable with a 10-year age difference. The only thing that isn’t registrable is penile vaginal intercourse.
So I drafted a bill. It’s four little words. All I’m doing is adding the sections of the statutory rape law to the sex offense registry. The possibility of getting on that registry is a better deterrent to those looking to exploit minors than anything else that we have in our toolkit.
If we are going to protect our children from sexual contact with an adult who’s at least 10 years older than they are, it certainly ought to include intercourse.
Feldstein Soto
Baker: Why is there this gap in the law, exempting men who have sexual intercourse with 14- to 17-year-old girls?
Feldstein Soto: Think about it. In the 1970s when the sex offender registry law was passed, our legislature was overwhelmingly older men. It’s a very odd exception, since they skipped right over that section. We should have consistent protection of our kids. If we are going to protect our children from sexual contact with an adult who’s at least 10 years older than they are, it certainly ought to include intercourse.
Baker: What is the current status of SB 1128?
Feldstein Soto: SB 1128 was approved by the Senate and passed the Public Safety Committee in the Assembly, but is now in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. Some groups were arguing with us that the bill wasn’t necessary. I argued it was.
Number one, it is deterrence.
Number two, it helps law enforcement, parents and communities identify individuals who’ve been committing sex crimes against minors in a given area.
And number three, the victims feel vindicated or at least treated equally under the law. What this bad man did to you is bad, as bad as what happens to other kids. It really helps with the healing of the girls.
Baker: Are there any other bills you’re supporting?
Feldstein Soto: Let me tell you about the bill that should not have died: AB 2419, where I partnered with Assemblymember Mike Gipson.
Traffickers control their minor victims through phones. The pimp will send a text saying, “Go to the corner of Florence and Gage, there’s a yellow Volkswagen that will come pick you up, he will give you a hundred for whatever.”
Our officers come in and interrupt the transaction, which is what we want. We don’t want to have to wait until the transaction actually happens. We don’t want to witness yet another violation of this child. Our officers go in and interrupt and cite the john, but then the phone will light up, with the pimp saying, “If you ever want to see your family alive again, don’t you dare say a word. Shut off your phone.” But unless we can show a felony, we can’t get a judge to issue a search warrant for the communications on the phone. Believe it or not, solicitation of a minor for the purposes of prostitution is a misdemeanor. It is not a felony. So, law enforcement can’t get a search warrant for the communications to show the fraud, force or coercion needed for a trafficking charge.
AB 2419 would have allowed a judge to issue a search warrant if the judge finds probable cause for misdemeanor solicitation of a minor for the purposes of prostitution. That would allow a search to obtain the communications on the phone. The phone is usually owned by the pimp, so we could subpoena the carrier information and show that this individual is running five, 10, 20, 30 girls. It’s a huge tool to move up the food chain and really make a case against the top predator.
For whatever reason, I got tremendous opposition from two legislators in particular, both of whom are men. They said this was going to be a huge invasion of privacy and that they didn’t trust law enforcement. They viewed it as a tool to harass trans women and LGBTQ+ youth. That’s literally what they said. I argued until I was blue in the face: This has nothing to do with the LGBTQ+ community. This is about our little girls. It’s a very reasonable bill. I will bring it back next year.
Baker: What about a bill to make solicitation of a minor a felony?
Feldstein Soto: That’s going to be harder. There’s an entire group that is against creating new crimes, and if you upgrade solicitation from a misdemeanor to a felony, you are going to trigger serious opposition from that whole group. They want to prevent criminalizing conduct beyond where it is. That’s why I chose this path—because AB 2419 did not create a new crime, enhance the sentencing or change the substantive law. The bill is a pure enforcement tool that requires law enforcement to go in front of a judge or a magistrate judge and show probable cause for each of the elements of the misdemeanor.
It has to actually be a minor. So, the bill does not affect adult sex workers, adult prostitution, consensual sex or statutory rape. I deliberately picked something that I thought no one could argue with because it’s not a new crime.
The amendment in the Assembly, which Assemblymember Gipson and I were happy to take, was that nothing in the phone could be used as evidence to bring or try or prosecute any criminal charges against the minor whose phone it was. We accepted that amendment, and the bill got out of the Assembly as amended.
When AB 2419 crossed over to the Senate, the Public Safety Committee in the Senate inserted a hostile amendment without Gipson’s or my consent—they inserted a requirement that the solicitation had to be in furtherance of human trafficking. That guts the bill.
Human trafficking is already a felony, and law enforcement can already get a search warrant for a felony. Actual sexual intercourse with a minor is a felony, so our officers would arrest and go get a search warrant, but only after actual harm to the child. So I sent a letter withdrawing my support.
I say, shame on Sacramento. They are not protecting our girls, and that’s not okay.
Baker: Is there anything you want Ms. readers to know or do with regard to this issue?
Feldstein Soto: Send in letters of support for these bills. I’ll bring them back next year. Let’s build a movement to protect our girls.
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