on chicago s westside, her first exposure to prostitution was right outside her front door. me being 9 years old, living in a community where prostitutes worked in front of our window and looking out the window of the prostitutes getting in and out of the cars with shiny dresses on and very beautiful and asking my grandmother, what are those women doing? and she told me, those women take their panties off and men give them money. and me being relating to that, because men had been taking my panties off and i said to myself, wow, i didn t know they were supposed to give me money. brenda says at 14, her grandmother encouraged her to sell herself in order to add money to the family purse. 1973, good friday, i proceeded to march on downtown to the gold coast and on the corner and that night i made over $400. and those guys knew that i was a minor. they knew that i was young. they paid me more because i was young.
i let you go back there, you understand? her hard life lessons ring loud and clear in the younger woman s area. at last, anna see as genuine opportunity to get away and agrees to take refuge for girls and young women struggling to escape prostitution. you ll let me do that? that s all i want to hear. give me a hug, you ain t going anywhere. you know, sometimes i believe that things happen for a reason and it s devine intervention and i feel that s what happened just now. brenda says there is no guarantees today s intervention will turn anna s life around, but at least for tonight, anna will be safe and warm, securing shelter from the storm of the under ground sex trade. we re trying to find that piece of them that s left, the best, of what s the best of them so we can help them bring it out
that s how i used to live with my pimp and my wife-in-laws. we all lived with him and we would do anything for him. you can benefit from kicking it with me. in the jargon of the underground sex trade, wife-in-laws are the women working in a pimp stable. the pimp is the daddy and the whole group including children, is called the family. but i know how the game go because i was in the game for 25 years. i know that it ain t easy to get out from under this game. a huge rule is not to snitch or talk about what goes on in that family. any systems that come at her trying to damage that family system, is an enemy. i can offer you all kinds of services to help you get a job. for now, brenda can see that jenny is not ready to accept the help the women s justice program can offer but brenda has opened a lifeline tonight and she will be there for jenny if and when jenny is ready to change her life.
against their spouses, the website is going to say oh we re not putting the hits on the spouses. we just set up the website. the fact that these people are doing it and we re then telling the law enforcement, yeah, the problem is by the time we get there the people are already dead. so we d rather you take the website down. i mean, come on! the cook county task force wants americans to know that online websites keep trafficked women ensnared in a cycle of perpetual violence. they like, went crazy. he put me in a choke hold. while they might view women as tough individuals making bad choices, brenda myers powell sees these women as walking wounded in desperate need of the public s need of empathy and intervention. i had some of the girls say it feels like someone is using the bathroom inside of me. when did you start doing this? the average prostitute turns five to six maybe ten tricks a day.
it s my decision. when asked about the plight of other women in the life, jessica says it is simply a matter of free will. it s what they want to do. the majority of those women were being controlled. they would never tell you that, but i hear things that a lot of times in interviews other people don t hear. come on in, have a seat. my name is brenda. while jessica is non-compliant, another young woman opens up to brenda revealing she is in crisis. i don t want to be on tv. if anyone sees my face, i can get killed. okay. because i don t know what s going on but i feel you, okay? the 22-year-old tells brenda that she s been working for a pimp from new york who despite his distance, controls his every move. the guy you re with now, how did you meet him? your pimp?