Police in Los Angeles County recovered a child sex trafficking victim during a raid of a vacant home used for a “superspreader” party, numerous sources reported.
The party was highly coordinated and involved breaking into the Palmdale home and using a rental truck to move party equipment. When police arrived Saturday night, they discovered more than 150 people, 116 of them adults and 35 of them juveniles, Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva said at a press conference.
More than 150 were arrested over the weekend at a massive underground party that the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department described as a “superspreader event” amid the coronavirus pandemic. https://t.co/4gGUADRFIQ pic.twitter.com/fV4suqv2v7
— ABC7 News (@abc7newsbayarea) December 9, 2020
The 17-year-old girl, who was categorized as a commercially sexually exploited child, was found at the party, along with 6 firearms. Police engaged first responder protocol, which approaches the individual as a victim in an effort to better serve trafficked children, a reform made a decade ago in response to the increase of children and young adults being arrested for prostitution and other related offenses.
“Parties like these often include drugs, prostitution, underage drinking, and violence, Villanueva said. He also said that while the “superspreader” event was a “flagrant violation” of Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s health orders, which prohibits gatherings of any size, what was discovered at the party was “criminal in nature.”
“Please understand that even without the health order, these actions were criminal in nature.”
Los Angeles County is under a stay-at-home order that will be in place for at least three weeks, and along with other counties, will be able to exempt itself from the orders on Dec. 28 if intensive care unit capacities for the following month are above or equal to 15%, according to ABC 7.
Some law enforcement agencies in California will be enforcing certain coronavirus restrictions with penalties like fines, while others have refused to enforce mask or gathering violations. (RELATED: Another California Sheriff Refuses To Send Deputies To Enforce Masks, ‘Social Gatherings Or Stay-At-Home Orders’)
Villanueva called on state and local politicians to support the police’s targeted enforcement of superspreader events, such as the one in Palmdale, and suggested that reorienting the focus on preventing these large gatherings would “be a far greater collective end result for public safety” than shutting down restaurants over non-compliance.
He has said his department would not enforce the order to shut down restaurants and other businesses, which he said have been doing their best to comply with restrictions.
NEW: L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva tells me his deputies will not take part in enforcing stay at home orders at businesses, which he says have been through enough. He says that’s the health department’s job, and LASD will focus on “super spreader” events instead. @FOXLA
— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) December 4, 2020
Sheriff Villanueva: “I want to stay away from business that are trying to comply, they bent over backwards to modify their operations to conform to these orders and then they have the rug yanked out from under them, that’s a disservice, I don’t want to make them more miserable.”
— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) December 4, 2020
“The health orders have created this existential threat for entrepreneurs, for small business owners and employees, he said. “They’re put in a difficult position between complying with the orders and putting food on the table for their families, and in government we should not be in a position of putting people in a precarious position.”
The outdoor dining ban in the county was initially scheduled to last three weeks, starting Nov. 25, but was then made indefinite. A county judge ordered health officials to conduct a risk-benefit analysis before extending the closures after the shutdown of restaurants was challenged as unconstitutional.
“I ask our state and local politicians to consider allowing our restaurant industry to be open and instead strongly support law enforcement on the targeted enforcement of super spreader events such as this one, which we believe will be a far greater collective end result for public safety.”