Reports of alleged prostitution more than doubled last month year over year in Northwest Dallas, continuing a longstanding trend of the city’s sex trade primarily manifesting in one council district, according to the Dallas Police Department’s (DPD) online records.
Council Member Omar Narvaez’s District 6 — a swath of Dallas which runs along Interstate 35 and Harry Hines Boulevard between Interstate 635 and Interstate 30 — saw alleged incidents of prostitution increase by 129.4% in April, according to the City of Dallas Open Data crime analytics dashboard.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, Narvaez’s district has seen the most reported incidents of sex trade-related criminal offenses in recent months, somehow almost exclusively.
This April, DPD recorded 39 alleged prostitution incidents, nine alleged cases of purchasing prostitution, one alleged instance of assisting or promoting prostitution, and one alleged incident of human trafficking for the purposes of facilitating commercial sex acts.
If the City’s numbers are to be believed, the sex trade in Dallas appears to only exist in District 6, mostly confined to the northern end.
Still, sex trafficking made headline news in North Texas earlier this year after some major multi-agency busts were conducted in Collin County and Tarrant County. Dozens of individuals were arrested in McKinney and Southlake for soliciting prostitution out of hotels.
“The terrible truth about human trafficking victims is that a large portion are forced into prostitution, with the average victim’s age ranging from 12 to 14 years old. The people that engage prostitutes are supporting the human trafficking trade and increasing demand,” said Texas Rep. Matt Shaheen (R-Plano) in the aftermath of the stings.
A request for comment was sent to Council Member Narvaez’s office. The Dallas Express asked why the only reports of alleged prostitution came out of his district, but no response was received by press time.
The Dallas Express, The People’s Paper, believes that important information about the city, such as crime rates and trends, should be easily accessible to you. Dallas has more crime per capita than hotspots like Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and New York, according to data from the FBI’s UCR database.
How did your area stack up on crime? Check out our interactive Crime Map to compare all Dallas City Council Districts. Curious how we got our numbers? Check out our methodology page here.