(PXN) The Montreal Police Department, in conjunction with the Laval and Longueuil police forces, announced earlier this week that they are working together on a new program called RADAR to detect and prevent sexual exploitation in areas where there are hotels and transportation services.
Dealing with the problem
The Association of Hotels of Greater Montreal, the Montreal Taxi Bureau, Info-Crime Montréal, the Centres for Assistance to Victims of Criminal Acts (CAVAC) and Sun Youth have also joined the initiative to form a common front to take on the problem of sexual exploitation.
RADAR was launched by the Montreal Police following a pilot project over the past year in partnership with hotels in Montreal. The project’s principal goal is to raise awareness of the problems among those most likely to be exposed and that they can contact the police if necessary.
According to the police, sex traffickers are known to use hotels, as well as other rental accommodations as working places for the prostitutes they exploit. They also are frequent users of transportation services for sending prostitutes to locations.
Detecting prostitution
The RADAR program was created specifically to detect prostitution taking place in hotel and transportation settings, with guidelines to determine when human or sexual trafficking is taking place. The police are currently offering orientation sessions to hotel service managers so as to teach them the signs to look out for and what to do when problems are detected.
The police can be reached for additional information at the following phone numbers: On the island of Montréal – (514) 280-2012; in Laval – (450) 978-6888 ext. 3485; on the territory of the agglomeration of Longueuil – (450) 463-7373.
