The high-profile conviction of wealthy playboy Frank Kim for sex crimes with prostitutes as young as 12 years old had no impact on the popularity of Vancouver's "kiddie stroll," says a prominent activist.
Hundreds of transactions involving the purchase of young girls for sex occur every day in Vancouver, says John Turvey, executive director of the Downtown Eastside Youth Activities Society.
"It was a horrifying case," Mr. Turvey said yesterday, adding that even so, it changed nothing.
The law remains inadequate to protect preadolescent and young adolescent girls from men who buy sex from them, he said. Police have not cracked down on the steady stream of men who buy sex from young girls, he added.
"The federal government still makes more noise about men who buy sex from young girls in the Third World than about what goes on right here," Mr. Turvey said.
Mr. Kim, convicted in 1999 and declared a dangerous offender the next year, was denied bail on Monday. He wants to be out of prison to prepare for an appeal of his conviction. A hearing date hasn't been set.
Amid widespread publicity, Mr. Kim was convicted of 27 offences, including sexual assault, sexually touching a person under the age of 14, assault with a weapon and unlawful confinement.
Most of the girls were aboriginal and drug addicts who were in the care of the B.C. Ministry of Children but who worked as prostitutes. The girls were 12 to 16 years old.
Mr. Kim, who was in his mid-20s at the time of the assaults, was born and raised in Kitchener, Ont. He told the court he spent $100,000 in one year on a new BMW that he used to pick up prostitutes and on partying almost every day. The girls testified that he gave them alcohol and drugs and raped them, sometimes videotaping the activities.
The court heard that Mr. Kim picked up girls in a well-known area of the city that Vancouver police tolerated for the child-sex trade. The prosecutor said Mr. Kim is a sexual predator involved in sexual sadism and addicted to sex.
In denying bail, Mr. Justice Ian Donald of the B.C. Court of Appeal said the circumstances of Mr. Kim's conviction demonstrate sexual deviancy and that the trial judge found he had no reasonable treatment prospects.
"The drug-addicted street children connected with this case form part of a particularly vulnerable group in our society and require protection from predators," Judge Donald wrote. "The public expects the law to provide that protection where it can."