A woman who says she’s a victim of sex trafficking has filed a $4 million lawsuit against a Portland motel, alleging it failed to prevent pimps from forcing her to have sex with countless men at the motel for more than a year.
The lawsuit doesn’t name the motel, its owners or employees and is heavily redacted to keep those identities from becoming public.
Court papers associated with the lawsuit say police and the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office have asked Joel Shapiro, the woman’s civil attorney, to keep that information confidential because it could jeopardize an ongoing criminal investigation. Notifying the motel could prompt the owners or employees to destroy evidence, harm witnesses or possibly flee, Shapiro wrote.
Judge Stephen Bushong approved blacking out the motel’s name in the lawsuit and using pseudonyms for the motel’s owners and employees. The suit won’t be served on the motel until the criminal investigation is completed, according to court papers.
The lawsuit was filed Friday in Multnomah County Circuit Court.
The suit seeks to hold the motel responsible for allegedly turning a blind eye to sex trafficking by failing to “take appropriate steps” to stop it. The suit claims the motel “knew or should have known” that the woman was being forced into prostitution while staying at the motel from September 2016 to January 2018 and that during that time the motel profited from the alleged crimes that took place within its walls.
Such suits are rare, but not unheard of.
In December 2017, the estate of a 25-year-old woman who was allegedly forced into sex acts at the DoubleTree hotel in Northeast Portland filed a $3.6 million lawsuit against the hotel as well as Backpage.com, the site that the suit alleges advertised the woman for sex.
The woman, Ashley Benson, was killed by a john in 2014 at the hotel -- and that lawsuit claims the hotel failed to establish policies to protect Benson from sex trafficking. That lawsuit is still ongoing.
This week’s lawsuit is also unusual because it was filed without naming the defendants and before a criminal investigation is completed.
-- Aimee Green