In naming its latest statewide human trafficking operation, the Ohio Attorney General’s Organized Crime Investigations Commission chose “Operation Next Door” as a way to bring home the message that the people committing these crimes are not distant strangers. They may, indeed, live right next door.
With the help of more than 100 law enforcement agencies, 135 people were arrested for seeking to buy sex — some of them from minors, according to state Attorney General Dave Yost’s office.
Of those 135, one was from Weirton.
In total, 103 were arrested for seeking to buy sex; 32 were arrested on felony charges including prostitution, compelling prostitution, seeking sex with a minor and drug possession and/or trafficking. Sixty-seven human trafficking survivors were referred to health care an