from www.kansascity.com – Kristy Childs has fought for a decade to give a voice to the voiceless.

In that time, she has helped hundreds of women and girls trying to escape the dehumanizing world of prostitution.

Now with the aid of an anonymous donor, Childs’ organization, Veronica’s Voice, is offering for the first time a safe place for women to live as they work to free themselves from the dangerous existence of women on the streets.

“This is huge,” said Childs.

The first residents will move into the house, called Magdalene Manor, at an undisclosed location in Kansas City. The home will augment the existing Veronica’s Voice safe center, where clients receive services and support, Childs said.

Childs believes there is only one other similar residential facility in the country for victims of the commercial sex trade, and Veronica’s Voice is only one of a handful of organizations like it in the country.

The persistent perception that prostitution is a victimless crime is belied by the lives of the 8,000 women and girls she has spoken to since founding Veronica’s Voice in 2000, Childs said.

The organization is named for one of those victims — Veronica Neverdusky — a friend of Childs’ who was 21 in 1993 when she was strangled and dumped in Kansas City’s Penn Valley Park.

The name of the organization’s new residential facility was chosen as a way to represent how society tends to malign women in those situations, Childs said. The biblical figure of Mary Magdalene has been portrayed unfairly as a prostitute, she said, although many scholars now say there is no basis in the Bible to support that.

“It’s a way to honor her and all of the women through history who have been labeled and criminalized,” Childs said. “We are changing the perception and show them as the victims they truly are.”

Childs knows as well as anyone how difficult it can be for a woman to escape that life. She lived it.

Many of the women she works with were sexually abused as children. They are often addicted to drugs, and controlled by pimps through violence and intimidation.

With Magdalene Manor, some of those women now will be able to get away from those pimps and be surrounded by caring and nonjudgmental people who understand their plight.

And the need is huge, Childs said. Most people don’t realize how pervasive the commercial sex trade is. Childs said Veronica’s Voice provides services to about 200 victims each year.

Magdalene Manor will allow Veronica’s Voice to provide its clients with a “totally new level of care,” Childs said.

“Beyond getting them off the streets, we want to see them in healthy lifestyles and able to live a better life,” she said.