In August, the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office promoted Samual Contreras and Christopher Wilson to be the agency’s first human trafficking investigators.

The new unit will be working with the multi-agency Partners Against Narcotics Trafficking taskforce and is “tasked with driving down demand for and assisting the victims of sex trafficking,” YCSO stated in a press release.

“It’s incredibly important, it’s something I’ve been working on [for] 10 years now. We’re starting to get more awareness and more resources to help in this fight,” YCSO Cmdr. Tom Boelts said.

“Sex trafficking is as prevalent here [in Yavapai County] as it is anywhere else,” YSCO spokeswoman Kristin Greene said. “We are along a major freeway route between south of the border [and] also going west to California. What we’re finding is that we’re not immune from it, and that it was enough of a problem that it warranted having two people who were dedicated to working on this issue.”

The YCSO press release stated the agency estimated that there are between 30 and 50 victims of sex trafficking in Yavapai County. Boelts attributed that number to an unidentified undercover detective from the Chandler Police Department who has worked with YCSO and the Prescott Police Department.

“He helped us with the stings we’ve set up, we just did one two weeks ago, and then there was another one [earlier this year],” Boelts said. “He’s making that estimate based on what he’s seen online and so he’s seeing ads for different people. That estimate comes from that.”

Greene described the scope of sex trafficking in the county as “somewhat unknown.”

“There are [sex trafficking] cases we have been tracking, but with the addition of these two new people who are focused solely on this issue, I think we’re going to find later what the actual scope is in our county,” Greene said.

Across Arizona, 337 victims of human trafficking were identified in 2021 by the National Human Trafficking Hotline. The sex trafficking unit will be paid for out of the county’s Anti-Drug and Human Trafficking Fund that was set up for fiscal years 2023 and 2024. YCSO received $500,000 from that fund. The department also received $578,452, and the Prescott Valley Police Department received $581,416, from the Prosecution and Imprisonment Fund that Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs announced on Friday, June 30.

“If we can locate a victim, we try to get that victim out of life,” Boelts said. “But that is very difficult. They are normally incredibly reluctant to come forward and oftentimes they’ll deny that they’re involved in what, what they appear to be involved in, for various reasons.”

“The big thing is watching what your kids are doing on their phones, and on their computers, because that’s how these folks are reaching out a lot of the times,” Wilson said. “These traffickers are predators, they’re good at luring kids mostly to come see them and once they come see them, that’s when the bad stuff happens. It’s in Yavapai County, it’s everywhere. I’m not saying that we’re the worst place in the world, but we’re going to make this the worst place in the world for these people to do this kind of business.”

Over the weekend of Sept. 30, the Prescott police arrested three suspects for alleged child sex trafficking and related charges in a multi-agency operation sting operation.

They were booked them into Yavapai County Detention Center in Camp Verde.