Human Scum

For ordinary people, it's hard to believe how reprehensible some individuals can be in their behaviour toward others. In Ottawa a trial has begun in which a 23-year-old has been charged with a pretty odious criminal offence. Jamie Byron, however, has pleaded not guilty to living off the avails of a prostitute, under the age of 18.

He had made contact with the girl through the Internet. She was looking for romance and he was looking for a meal ticket. Through their Facebook communication he persuaded the teenaged girl who has a learning disability to travel from her home near Windsor to Montreal. The Crown prosecutor claims that Jamie Byron "recruited, exploited and assaulted", the girl.

He informed her when she arrived in Montreal that she would be "working for him". And he set about placing her on a prostitution circuit for the following several months. Circulating her in Montreal, Toronto, Barrie and Ottawa. He had destroyed her identification papers, forced her to have sex with johns, beginning in the summer of 2011, and handing over her earnings to him.

The girl informed police that she had been forced to give paid sex to over a hundred men. She was forced into prostitution, against her will. And forced to surrender all the money she made through prostitution to the man who called her his "meal ticket". She tried on several occasions to escape her nightmare, but he tracked her down and retrieved her, as his personal possession.

In 2011 an Ottawa police detective posed online as a john, arranging to meet her at a hotel. And that was when she was rescued from her miserable, tawdry, soul-destroying situation. Once she was interviewed by police a Canada-wide warrant was issued, and Jamie Byron was arrested. He is now on trial, having pleaded not guilty to nine charges; human trafficking, assault and living off the avails of a prostitute under 18.

She was not his only "meal ticket", there were others.  Police took custody of cellphone records, hotel receipts and escort advertisements posted online featuring his cellphone number, as evidence to be presented at trial. Earlier another individual whom the Crown said arranged for hotel rooms for Byron pleaded guilty to the charge of procuring prostitution, receiving a nine-month conditional sentence, and a year of probation.

Living among us: the scum of the Earth.