KPTV - FOX 12Local gangs using prostitution to fund violence

At crime scenes, it's easy to see the impact of gang-related violence on Portland. However, for every victim you see on the streets, more victims are suffering silently behind closed doors. 

Prostitution has become one of the top moneymakers for local gangs, second only to drug dealing, according to local outreach workers.

"I got jumped into the gang by being raped by all of them, and then forced onto 82^nd Avenue," said Jeri Williams, a survivor of gang-related prostitution. 

Williams says she was forced into the lifestyle two decades ago by her roommate's brother, who was a Crips gang member.

"I was locked in a room everyday from the outside and only allowed to go out to use the bathroom and eat, and of course, walk the street," said Williams who worked from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., seven days a week. 

Williams says shame and fear kept her and other victims quiet.

"One of the biggest rules about being in a gang is you don't tell," said Williams.

Jeri Williams escaped her nightmare only after being stabbed and left for dead by a "john" in Southeast Portland.

She now works for Portland's Office of Neighborhood Involvement, helping other sex-trafficking survivors, a growing number of whom were held captive by gangs.

"A man can sell a drug one time and that drug is gone," said Williams. "He can sell a woman thousands of times, or a young girl thousands of times."

She estimates sex-trafficking has become the second-biggest moneymaker for gangs in Portland, so profitable that she says different gangs will, at times, work together.

"Money is more important than women, so in this case, we'll go over our property lines and we'll share these women or exchange these women because money is more important than women."

Tonya Dickens, a veteran gang outreach worker, who runs the non-profit Brother's and Sister's Keepers has rescued young women from lives of gang-imposed prostitution.

"The hardest part to understand is these are babies," said Dickens. "They haven't had a chance to live."

She says some of the girls involved can be as young as 11 or 12.

"That is the age these young ladies are being groomed and being prepped, being taken on as friends," Dickens described.  "It's easy for one day that friendship to turn just a quick as it started."

Dickens says it can happen in a child's neighborhood or even at a school. A victim may know her pimp through friends or even family. Ultimately, the girls are looking for a sense of belonging.

"I've said it once, and I will say it again; it's love and self-respect," said Dickens. "If you don't love you, and you don't respect you, and you don't think you're the best thing that happened, no one else will."

Dickens says she focuses on building self-esteem and connecting the girls she rescues with family members and role-models who will help them recover from emotional and physical abuse that leave a lasting mark.

"They have been beaten down so much in that short time, but it has cost almost a lifetime of damage," said Dickens.

But survivors, including Jeri Williams, know a brighter future is possible. Her mission now is saving women from a lifestyle no one should have to suffer.

Williams says what the city needs more than anything is a shelter, specifically for victims. She also hopes police and city leaders take note of the growing connection between gangs and human trafficking.

Copyright 2011 KPTV. All rights reserved.