[NEWS] Minnesota arrests 58 in child sex sting during NCAA Final Four weekend – Loganspace AI

(Reuters) – Minnesota authorities arrested 58 of us accused of making an are attempting to solicit young of us for sex or for trafficking in a sting operation staged all around the NCAA Remaining Four basketball tournament, enlighten authorities said on Wednesday.

The sting, which resulted in the rescue of 28 victims from trafficking eventualities, including one minor, occurred Friday via Monday as undercover brokers posed as minors or as sex investors and chatted with suspects on social media platforms. Investigators arrested the suspects as they arrived at an arranged assembly self-discipline for an diagram upon, the Minnesota Division of Public Security said in a observation.

These arrested were now no longer section of a single sex-trafficking ring, Jill Oliveira, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension with the Division of Public Security, said.

“These were separate cases the put they both spoke back to undercover officers posing as sex investors or undercover officers posing as minors,” Oliveira said.

Hundreds of faculty basketball followers converged on Minneapolis closing weekend to leer the semifinal and closing rounds of the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s men’s championship, received this 300 and sixty five days by the University of Virginia.

A total of 47 of us were booked on criminal charges of solicitation of a minor or solicitation of prostitution with someone below 16 years of age, whereas one more 11 were booked on possible motive on the assist of sex trafficking and promotion of prostitution, the agency said.

“This operation is an example of the aggressive steps mandatory to complete traffickers and johns who opt and promote of us for sex in our communities,” said Drew Evans, superintendent of the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.

The sting comes lower than two months after Current England Patriots owner Robert Kraft became charged with soliciting sex as section of an investigation into sex trafficking at several Florida day spas. Kraft, who has pleaded now no longer responsible, became one of 25 men who were taken into custody in the sting.