1 of 8 You-Mi Kim, an intercourse trafficking target, walks through the Tenderloin at night Sun salon where she utilized to operate. She now lives in san francisco bay area and it is from the intercourse company. This woman is now students. Photographed in bay area on 11/23/05. (Deanne Fitzmaurice/ The Chronicle) Deanne Fitzmaurice Show More Show Less

2 of 8 You-Mi Kim, an intercourse trafficking target, requires a coach to college. She now lives in bay area and it is out from the intercourse company. This woman is now students. Photographed in bay area on 11/18/05. (Deanne Fitzmaurice/ The Chronicle) Deanne Fitzmaurice Show More Show Less

4 of 8 You-Mi Kim, a intercourse trafficking victim, now lives in bay area and is from the intercourse business. She actually is now students. Photographed in bay area on 11/18/05. (Deanne Fitzmaurice/ The Chronicle) Deanne Fitzmaurice Show More Show Less

5 of 8 You-Mi Kim, a intercourse trafficking target, walks along Baker Beach that has been one of many San that is first Francisco her boyfriend brought her to see. She now lives in san francisco bay area and it is out from the intercourse company. She actually is a student. Photographed in bay area on 7/8/06. (Deanne Fitzmaurice/ The Chronicle) Deanne Fitzmaurice Show More Show Less

7 of 8 trafficking_043_df.jpg You-Mi Kim, a intercourse trafficking target, now lives in bay area and is from the intercourse business. This woman is now students. Photographed in bay area on 6/28/06. (Deanne Fitzmaurice/ The Chronicle) Deanne Fitzmaurice Show More Show Less

Navigating through the junkies and hustlers in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district, You Mi Kim discovered the steel protection home she ended up being in search of, and squeezed the buzzer.

Inside Sun salon therapeutic massage parlor, the supervisor saw You Mi regarding the surveillance digital camera and tossed some ocean sodium throughout the limit — a Korean training to reduce the chances of misfortune.

It absolutely was 2003 july. It turned out five months as you Mi was lured from her house in Southern Korea by worldwide intercourse traffickers, that has tricked the debt-ridden university student with claims of the high-paying hostess task in the us.

After forcing her into intercourse strive to spend them nearly $20,000, the traffickers had finally allow her get. But freedom had been evasive.

Traffickers had taken all her earnings, yet she nevertheless encountered a $40,000 shopping financial obligation home — the reason why she left for the American work that promised big pay. Now, no fewer than six creditors had been circling her family members in Southern Korea.

Almost any task she might get as a illegal immigrant — cleansing domiciles or washing meals in a restaurant — would not spend her debts over time. She wished to protect her family members through the shame of bankruptcy. She desired her life straight straight straight back.

You Mi felt no choice was had by her.

On her behalf first day’s freedom, she took an unlicensed taxi that is korean Los Angeles to a different illicit therapeutic therapeutic massage parlor in san francisco bay area.

The entranceway of this Sun Spa exposed. The manager, a Korean girl in her 50s, led You Mi inside and quickly handed her off into the masseuse because of the many seniority.

For the following four months, You Mi would be an individual she never imagined. She and five other intercourse employees would share an apartment that is dingy O’Farrell Street across through the Mitchell Brothers O’Farrell Theatre. She’d spend her waking hours at Sun salon, sex with over a dozen males each day, six times per week, and scurrying into key hideaways during police raids.

She’d discover the rumors about bay area to be real: it absolutely was a booming end in the worldwide sex-trafficking route. There clearly was tons of money to be produced. Clients abundant, guidelines great.

But first, she would need to surrender her final shred of dignity.

The very first end on the sunlight salon trip ended up being the five spaces from the bottom flooring, employed for the regulars. These people were small, lower than 50 square foot and bare aside from a cot with one sheet that is white a bath and a tiny painted nightstand within one part. A mirror covered the majority of the wall surface nearby the sleep. a fluorescent roof light cast Buffalo chicas escort a pallid green radiance throughout the space.

Upstairs, You Mi saw four spaces embellished to appear like genuine Chinese acupressure and therapeutic therapeutic massage spaces. They certainly were cleaner, with therapeutic therapeutic massage tables as opposed to beds. The condoms had been concealed.