The National Strategy for Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction

significantly overall. 71 However, the number of reported incidents declined sharply in 2008 (392)and again in 2009 (247), most likely reflecting an improved ability of child sex tourists tooperate online in a less detectable fashion. Previously, law enforcement agencies were quitesuccessful in identifying predators that planned travel through sex tour providers, but now mostpredators avoid such companies and instead make their own travel arrangements and wait untilthey arrive in the country to begin coordinating their illicit activity.2. Child sex tourists often engage in many forms of child exploitation, causingextreme and lasting damage to victims.Sex tourists are increasingly creating child pornography by recording their acts of child sexualabuse to bring home as souvenirs. After returning home, child sex tourists may share or sell theirimages and videos with other child predators. Images of the child’s abuse are permanentlymemorialized and impossible to remove from circulation once they enter the Internet stream.Some sex tourists also write graphic online accounts of their experiences and share informationon how to find and abuse children in foreign locations. These accounts may entice otherpredators to engage in sex tourism.The children abused by sex tourists suffer not only sexual abuse but also physical abuse andlasting health problems. Sex tourists often are violent in abusing children in foreign countriesbecause they believe their victims will not report the offenses. Children sold in brothels oftensuffer from illnesses, exhaustion, malnourishment, infections, physical injuries, and sexuallytransmitted diseases. Living conditions are poor and medical treatment is rarely available tothem. Children who fail to earn enough income generally are subject to severe punishment suchas beatings and starvation.3. Investigating and prosecuting American child sex tourists is very difficult;however, a change in child exploitation laws has aided prosecutors.Child sex tourists usually travel alone to foreign countries and operate in secret. Identifyingvictims and finding locations where abuse occurred is difficult, and evidence of the crime oftenis not preserved. Compounding the difficulties are differences in investigation and conflicts oflaw. Some investigative techniques such as wiretaps, covert recordings, and closed circuittelevision surveillance are prohibited in certain countries, and procedures for obtaining evidencemust follow U.S. standards to be admissible in a U.S. prosecution. Moreover, the time andexpense of sending investigators abroad and bringing witnesses to the United States for trial issignificant and, for state or local agencies, the cost often is prohibitive. Prosecutors also faceextradition challenges and considerable administrative obstacles when securing witnesses.Additionally, it is difficult for foreign victims to come to the United States and live in anunfamiliar environment for several weeks, often without family members, while they awaittestifying. Also, victims may be ostracized by their family and within their communities whenthey return home. Document translation also is time consuming and costly.Despite the obstacles, many American child sex tourists are arrested and, in fact, prosecution hasbecome easier. Since the enactment of the Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end the71See Appendix D, NCMEC, Figure 7.37