Capital News Service

Baltimore has become a hub for human trafficking because of its interstate highways and proximity to major airports, city and state officials say. But few human traffickers are arrested, and even fewer are convicted — while police continue to make hundreds of prostitution arrests every year.

Labor trafficking can be found in sweatshops, on farms, in restaurants and nail salons, on construction crews and custodial staffs and in American households, according to the Maryland Human Trafficking Task Force. Labor trafficking victims are more commonly immigrants brought to the United States than Americans

The traffickers aren’t always the flashy, bling-wearing, urban street pimps Hollywood portrays, the records show. They are sex salesmen who use business cards and online classifieds like Backpage to market their products. The business — often referred to by insiders as “The Game” — includes strategy and deception.

Their stories, taken from court records, sketch out a common theme: Traffickers find vulnerable young women, seduce them with promises of security, then force them into the sex trade.

When they resist, they are beaten, drugged, threatened with the loss of their children.

And the businesses are everywhere. From a brick house in a quiet neighborhood to a three-star hotel near a swanky mall, sex trafficking has infiltrated the most ordinary of surroundings in Maryland.

Utilities are installing “smart meters” to save money on meter readers and to save energy. But 25,000 Marylanders have chosen to opt out of the program over fears about health and loss of privacy.

State bans on same-sex marriage are founded on “hate, prejudice, ignorance, fear or moral disapproval,” according to a report issued Thursday by Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh.

Gov. Larry Hogan on Tuesday asked a Maryland Democratic leader to support his fiscal agenda, but by the afternoon, a committee charged with hammering out budget differences appeared to be waiting for him to make the next move.