Kids recruited from foster care are for sale at LA’s sex-trafficking corridor ‘The Blade’ — and cops are powerless to stop it

Anyone who wants to have sex with a young girl in Los Angeles can drive to “the Blade,” a notorious red-light district where 12-year-olds are openly walking the streets — and cops are all but powerless to thwart the disgusting pedo bazaar.

The children line up along a 2-mile section of Figueroa Street — a k a “the Kiddle Stroll” — clad in next to nothing to indulge in their johns’ sickest fantasies for around a hundred bucks.

Many of the girls were recruited from the foster-care system after being seduced on social media, authorities said.

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Occasionally, they do their rounds with bruises and split lips — souvenirs from violent pimps who savagely beat them when they step out of line or don’t meet their quota.

Earlier last year, a group of local and federal law enforcement agencies launched an initiative to crack down on the trafficking and rescue the victims.

In August, the city attorney’s office announced that 190 traffickers had been arrested and 200 children rescued, some as young as 12.

Yet a trafficking victim interviewed by the New York Times said “the Blade” is now busier than ever before, with young girls being shipped in from across the country.

The growing throngs of exploited children inspired a nickname for the district from the LA city attorney: “Kiddie Stroll.”

At the state level, new laws have hampered authorities’ ability to identify victims and prosecute their traffickers.

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Some of these laws were meant to shift blame away from trafficking victims and onto their pimps, including one law passed in 2019 that treats underage prostitutes as victims of abuse rather than criminal offenders.

But another controversial law — SB-357, passed in 2023 — bars law enforcement from approaching an underage victim based on how she’s dressed.

A 12-year-old girl could walk by in lingerie, and there would be nothing a police officer could do about it.

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The law kicked off a prostitution free-for-all, critics claim — and not just in Los Angeles.

“You saw an uptick, especially for those being trafficked, up and down the state. They saw an increase of people being forced to sell themselves after the passage of SB 357,” said Stephany Powell, an anti-human trafficking advocate and former sergeant in the LAPD’s Vice Division.

Powell works with non-profits, including the National Center on Sexual Exploitation to provide help and resources for trafficked minors.

“When [SB-357] got passed, the pimps were putting out on their social media, telling the girls they better get out there and work because prostitution was now legal. They thought prostitution was legal, and it made them work those girls even harder. Because now if it’s legal, you gotta get out there and get that money,” she said.

Powell, who is black, said the law defeated its own purpose of protecting minorities: Almost half of trafficked women in the U.S. are black and brown, and the law only makes it harder to protect this vulnerable group.

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LA’s notorious Hoover Gang is behind much of the trafficking on Figueroa Street, authorities say.

In August, the US Attorney General announced the arrest of 11 Hoover ringleaders, including Amaya “Lady Duck” Armstead, 25, an alleged prostitution queenpin who was specifically charged with trafficking a 14-year-old girl.

The joint bust by local and federal agencies was a crown jewel in LA’s ongoing fight against exploitation in Los Angeles. Yet business continues to boom.

A recent police ride-along by a Times reporter revealed that young girls are still walking Figueroa Street.

Many of the underage girls arrested by police during that ride-along had been booked before, but they had refused to go to a shelter and ended up back with their pimps.