There has been growing concern over sex trafficking of children in the United States. Demand for sex with children (and other forms of commercial sexual exploitation of children) is steady, and profit to sex traffickers has increased. While law enforcement, policy makers, social service providers, and the public have acknowledged the presence of this issue, they have grappled with measuring the extent of child sex trafficking as well as determining how best to combat it from a number of angles. Within the criminal justice realm, law enforcement is tasked with investigating and prosecuting both the supply side (sex traffickers, or pimps) as well as the demand side (buyers of commercial sex) of sex trafficking. In addition to the challenges in prosecuting traffickers and buyers of sex with children, law enforcement faces challenges with how to handle the girls and boys whose bodies are sexually exploited for profit. Indeed, the U.S. view of juveniles involved in commercial sexual activity has evolved over the past decade. How to categorize the juveniles involved in commercial sexual activities has become one of the perennial issues for law enforcement and policy makers. A central question is whether these youth should be characterized as victims or perpetrators. The federal government and some states have conceptualized these children differently, and this variability has contributed to the implementation of differing policies throughout the country. In short, while the federal government considers these minors as victims and thus eligible for specialized services, some states may still treat these minors as perpetrators engaged in prostitution and related crimes. This report examines juvenile victims of sex trafficking and their intersection with states' juvenile justice systems throughout the United States. It outlines the federal conceptualization of minors involved in commercial sexual activities and discusses factors that may contribute to the treatment of sex trafficking victims as perpetrators. It then outlines various criminal justice policy options and approaches to victim-centered policing regarding sex trafficking of minors. The report concludes with a discussion of the federal role in incentivizing states' juvenile and criminal justice systems and treatment of sex trafficking victims. The Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA) is the primary law that addresses human trafficking. In outlining what constitutes "severe forms of trafficking in persons," the TVPA includes both sex trafficking and labor trafficking. Generally, both forms of trafficking involve some element of force, fraud, or coercion. With respect to sex trafficking, however, the law specifies that when a minor —an individual under the age of 18—is involved, the commercial sexual activity need not contain force, fraud, or coercion in order to be deemed sex trafficking. In other words, for purposes of prosecuting a trafficker, if a minor is involved in a commercial sex act, he or she is considered a victim of sex trafficking (and thus a victim of a severe form of trafficking in persons) in the federal government's eyes. Notable elements of this position include the following: A minor is considered a victim of trafficking regardless of whether the commercial sex act is believed to be forced or voluntary. A minor is considered a victim of trafficking regardless of whether the minor represents himself/herself as an adult. The law provides that in prosecutions involving a minor victim, the government is not required to prove that the defendant knew that the victim was under the age of 18. A minor is considered a victim of trafficking regardless of whether he or she is removed from his or her community. As the TVPA considers juveniles involved in prostitution as victims of trafficking, federal enforcement efforts are aimed at combating the traffickers and buyers of commercial sex. At the federal level, these perpetrators are often prosecuted for violations of the Mann Act, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act (RICO), or the TVPA. Notably, the investigation and prosecution of child prostitution are mostly state matters. Every state outlaws the prostitution of children as well as human trafficking broadly (including sex trafficking of children). However, despite their protected status at the federal level, juvenile victims of sex trafficking may at times be labeled and treated as criminals or juvenile delinquents at the state and local levels. Consequently, these children may be arrested and placed in juvenile detention facilities with juveniles who have committed serious crimes instead of in environments where they can receive needed social and protective services. In addition, because of being processed through the criminal justice system, they may then have permanent records as offenders. Some researchers have noted that labeling these victims as prostitutes or offenders and subsequently placing them in the juvenile justice system is a practice that may further harm these victimized youth. A number of factors may, alone or in combination, contribute to the criminalization of juvenile trafficking victims. One such factor is the variability in state laws regarding sexual activities and youth. For example, states may take varying stances regarding the criminality of prostitution and solicitation. They may also have differing thresholds for the age of consent, or when an individual can legally consent to sexual intercourse (this typically ranges from 16-18 years of age). In addition, states may adopt different cutoff ages for when an individual is considered a juvenile or an adult for criminal justice purposes under state law. Another factor impacting the potential criminalization of juvenile sex trafficking victims involves awareness of key indicators that may help in identifying victims. Victims often do not readily self-identify as such, and this leaves the challenge of victim identification to authorities such as law enforcement and social service providers. A law enforcement officer who has not been trained in identifying children as victims of commercial sexual exploitation may mistakenly charge a child with a crime such as prostitution. In addition to instances in which victims may enter into the juvenile justice system because law enforcement does not perceive that the juvenile is a trafficking victim, there are cases in which juveniles enter the system despite law enforcement knowing that the juvenile is a victim. An officer who recognizes that an individual is a victim may charge the individual with a crime so as to place the victim into one of the only available safe and secure environments—a detention facility within the juvenile justice system. There are few safe facilities for child victims of sex trafficking, and law enforcement may rely on the security of juvenile justice facilities, even if they may not be the most appropriate option for the placement of trafficking victims. The most recent data indicate that "136 males and 443 females under 18 years of age were reported to the federal government as having been arrested for prostitution or commercialized vice by state and local authorities" in 2012. Of note, there are no comprehensive data that address the number of prostituted or otherwise sexually trafficked juveniles who are treated as offenders. Several studies provide some insight into this number, including how law enforcement agencies process children who are prostituted. These studies vary widely, however, in their populations considered, time frames examined, and conclusions drawn. One study, conducted by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), relied on National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data from 76 law enforcement agencies in 13 states. Researchers examined 241 prostitution incidents between 1997 and 2000 that involved juvenile offenders, juvenile victims, or both. Findings from this study reveal that, across these 241 incidents, 229 juveniles were implicated as offenders, and arrests were made in about 74% of those cases. Although the percentage of juveniles involved in prostitution who were arrested is lower than the percentage of adult prostitutes arrested (90%), this nonetheless suggests that in the sample examined, juveniles were more likely to be treated as offenders than as victims. Researchers cautioned that the data were "based on a small number of cases from an unrepresentative sample of jurisdictions." Of note, data from this research were obtained from prostitution cases occurring before the enactment of the TVPA. While the TVPA is federal legislation, and the cases in this study come from state and local law enforcement agencies, the TVPA may have influenced states' perceptions and treatment of juveniles involved in commercial sex; as such, the results from this research may not be reflective of modern trends. Another review, part of the National Juvenile Prostitution Study, surveyed police about their juvenile prostitution cases from 2005. Using survey data from 132 agencies, researchers categorized juveniles as victims, as delinquents, or as both victims and delinquents based on how they were treated by police. Juveniles were categorized as being treated as victims if (1) only the exploiter was arrested or (2) the juvenile and exploiter were arrested but the charge against the juvenile was not a prostitution-related charge (e.g., disturbing the peace or a drug charge). Juveniles were categorized as being treated as delinquents if they were the only ones arrested or detained. They were categorized as being treated as both victims and delinquents if the exploiter was arrested on a charge specific to a sexual assault against a minor and the juvenile was also arrested on a prostitution-related charge. Based on this classification, 53% of juveniles were classified as victims, 31% as delinquents, and 16% as both victims and delinquents. For the cases where a child was classified as both a victim and delinquent, researchers examined the case summaries more carefully to see whether they could be classified more accurately as victims or as delinquents. In all cases, researchers were prompted to change the status to victim only because either (1) the initial charges were dropped or (2) there was a specific comment from the investigator that the only reason the juvenile was charged was so they could get needed services. Overall, 69% of juveniles were ultimately classified as victims and 31% as delinquents. The study found a strong and significant association between how the case came to the police's attention and how the juvenile was treated by law enforcement.