The NBA made a mistake rushing head-first into politics.
Now the league is trying to burnish its image and bring back fans.
But one unspeakable crime happened at this NBA game.
The NBA has been fighting against bad press.
League owners have been trying to downplay the negative impact of the anti-American anthem protests that bled over from the NFL.
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban even stopped playing the national anthem before games until he was pressured to do so.
Now Cuban and the Mavericks are dealing with an ugly crime that took place at a game.
A 15-year-old girl was taken by sex traffickers at the American Airlines Center, and thankfully found at a hotel in Oklahoma over a week later.
From Fox News:
“The girl went to use the bathroom while attending the Mavericks game with her father and never returned, according to a press release from her family’s attorney, Zeke Fortenberry of the Fortenberry Firm, PLLC. She was gone for 10 days until authorities located her at an Extended Stay America hotel in Oklahoma City on April 18. The Oklahoma City Police Department has arrested Saniya Alexander, Melissa Wheeler, Chevaun Gibson, Kenneth Nelson, Sarah Hayes, Karen Gonzales, Thalia Gibson and Steven Hill in connection to the trafficking case. Gibson is charged with offering to engage in prostitution; Nelson, Hayes and Gonzales are charged with human trafficking and distribution of child pornography; Hill is charged with rape; Gibson and Alexander have felony warrants; and Wheeler has a robbery warrant.”
The Dallas Police Department (DPD) would not open a kidnapping case because there was no video evidence of an actual abduction, so it was treated as a missing persons case.
The teen’s family had to turn to a nonprofit group called the Texas Counter-Trafficking Initiative (TXCTI), which ultimately worked to find the girl.
The family wants answers from DPD, the American Airlines Center, and the Extended Stay hotel that had lax policies in place which led to the trafficking.
Fox New continued:
“Now, her family is demanding answers as to why the DPD and AAC did not do more to help locate the girl when she went missing. They are also demanding answers from Extended Stay America, which Fortenberry alleges did not implement safety and security protocols to protect the girl from a registered sex offender who used a fake name and ID card to rent rooms at the hotel chain’s location in Oklahoma City. The offender was allegedly able to purchase multiple hotel rooms for multiple nights. Additionally, Fortenberry said in the press release that a fraudulent ticket seller known to the AAC and Mavericks may have sold a fake ticket to a male suspect who allegedly lured the victim from the sports center.”
This is the last type of scandal that the Mavericks or the NBA needed.
Thankfully the girl was found alive, but trafficking has become a serious problem that often gets under-covered by the so-called mainstream media.