Stories about child sex-trafficking are heartbreaking to hear. What’s even more striking is when the reporters behind the microphone are just as young as their subjects.

In a powerful two-part series that aired this week on NPR’s All Things Considered, reporters with Youth Radio produced a raw and revealing portrait child sex-trafficking. The series offers some important perspective for Hawaii, where sex-trafficking is also a concern.

The reports result from a six-month investigation in Oakland, Calif. Youth Radio, an independent producer, describes the series as piecing together “what life is like for girls who are forced into prostitution — and how law enforcement continues to criminalize girls the state legally defines as sexually exploited victims.”

• Part 1: Trafficked Teen Girls Describe Life In ‘The Game’
• Part 2: Arresting Youth In Sex Trafficking Raises Debate

The series is gripping in large part because it features the voices of two articulate young women who used to work the streets as teens. One was kidnapped off the street, raped and forced into prostitution by her rapist. The other started turning tricks after a boyfriend she trusted suggested it as a way to make money.

Part 2 of the series explores the issue from law enforcement officials’ perspective. Even in Oakland, a city identified by the FBI as a “high-intensity child-prostitution area”, law enforcement say few pimps are arrested. Police explain that arresting juvenile prostitutes is one way to at least get them off the streets.

At Civil Beat, we’ve also been investigating human trafficking. We’ve been collecting data from the Honolulu Police Department’s daily arrest log to find out what local law enforcement is doing — or not doing — to enforce prostitution laws and combat human trafficking.

• Selling Sex in Honolulu: Police Focus Prostitution Arrests on Women, Not Men
• Selling Sex in Honolulu: Prostitution Busts for Men Turn Up Mostly Locals, Few Tourists
• Selling Sex in Honolulu: Unlicensed Massage Parlors Lack Enforcement Scrutiny
• Selling Sex in Honolulu: The Sentences

Honolulu is no Oakland, but two large cases involving exploited farm workers are set to go to trial here, including the largest human trafficking case filed in U.S. history.

Ugly as it is, the issue can’t drop from our radar. In-depth reporting like the radio series on the issue is welcome — and needed.