A 16-year-old girl and nine others were rescued from sex traffickers during a major sting operation at Comic-Con in San Diego last weekend.
The underage girl and other victims were being forced to work as prostitudes servicing attendees at the star-studded gathering of fans, authorities said.
During a three-day operation, undercover agents were able to identify the women and remove them from the people trafficking them.
Posing as sex buyers, the California law enforcement officers made contact with the victims and then attempted to identify their traffickers, California Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office said.
Operatives also posted advertisements soliciting sex to identify buyers.
No traffickers were arrested in the operation, but the agents were able to lure out and arrest 14 johns.
The victims were offered support services, according to the AG’s office.
“Unfortunately, sex traffickers capitalize on large-scale events such as Comic-Con to exploit their victims for profit,” said Bonta in a statement.
“These arrests send a clear message to potential offenders that their criminal behavior will not be tolerated.”
Comic-Con regularly draws more than 130,000 attendees.
“There is no more insidious crime than human trafficking,” San Diego Sheriff Kelly Martinez said in a statement. “The coercion and violence which enslaves people for profit, and places them into forced labor or sex is criminal.”
It was not the first time Comic-Con has been at the center of controversy.
In 2014, an organization of women called Geeks for CONsent gathered nearly 3,000 signatures demanding the event adopt a formal anti-harassment policy after what they described as an atmosphere of sexual harassment at the event.
The group interviewed female attendees who described being frequently groped, unwillingly photographed and even followed while at Comic-Con. They also complained of a pervasive atmosphere of sexual objectification of women.
Comic-Con organizers said at the time that the safety of its attendees was paramount, and promised to improve security.
