Five people were arrested in Casper Thursday during a prostitution sting designed to recover human trafficking victims."Operation Cross Country" is an annual nationwide event. Casper police Detective Dan Dundas says, "The purpose of it is to conduct vice operations to hopefully recover juveniles who have been sex trafficked, who have essentially been brought into the world of prostitution against their will and basically held in indentured servitude by pimps and other people who are involved in the sex trade." Dundas says they so far this year have not recovered any trafficking victims, although in 2014 they rescued a juvenile female who had been sold into the sex trade for a hundred dollars.

Detective Dundas says this is the fourth year C.P.D. has participated in the operation. "The reason we do it is that the Rocky Mountain region has led the nation in recovered juveniles the last few years," he says, "which for people who think prostitution isn’t a problem and It’s a victimless crime, think about the juvenile females who are forced to sleep with grown men against their will."

Natrona County Sheriff's Department
Natrona County Sheriff's Department
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Police arrested Bailey Bruce and Canisha Martinez of the Casper area; Cassandra Combs of St. Paul, Minnesota; and Alexandra Tyler, who was listed as homeless. All were charged with prostitution. David Magnus of Casper was also arrested, and charged with soliciting prostitution.  Records say he agreed to pay an undercover officer a quarter pound cheeseburger and fries for sex, and was arrested when he showed up with the meal in hand. Detective Dundas says that exchange isn't something they generally run into. "Hooking for cheeseburgers isn't normal," he said, and had some advice for would-be clients. "For people in the Casper area that are thinking about committing acts of prostitution or soliciting it just remember that when you make that phone call it might be the Casper P.D. on the other side of the phone."

 

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