12.10.2018
human trafficking, public safety, sex trafficking, Uncategorized
As good as the world seems today, there are still many who are living horrid lives in the world today (https://www.goodnet.org/articles/10-good-things-in-our-world-that-are-getting-better). According to the US State Department, approximately 800,000 people are illegally trafficked across international borders every year (https://www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11-facts-about-human-trafficking).
Just think about the enormity of that number. That is nearly one million souls, destined for a horrendous life of slavery, in all illicit forms of human depravity. They will be owned by other humans who will treat them appallingly. They will have no rights whatsoever. They will live in fear, probably beaten, starved and raped. And out of these 800,000, some 80% are female and half are children.
These people in many cases are fleeing war torn countries. We only have to turn on our news programs to find some story of refugees trying desperately to reach a safer land. Their boat has capsized, or they suffered inhumane conditions, piled all together into the back of a lorry. Many dying from dehydration and heat exhaustion. The lengths these people go to, to find sanctuary. And most of the time we can sit back, feel sorry for them, and turn the television off. Because we can.
I too have done this, I cannot look at the images anymore, because it’s too upsetting.
More needs to be done to stop this. It is the 21st Century, and slavery is alive and well and doing a roaring trade. In this age of technology and better policing, why are countries not able to halt this?
There does not seem to be a single database that can be used worldwide, to keep track of humans missing, so every country can access it, and keep updating it. It is just too big, and with information in different languages, and much social media footage out there, we have not gotten around to creating a single, go to site, for this purpose – we have the technology, we have the cloud computing, biometrics, facial imaging, but sharing data is still a problem.
In the US the Polaris Project is a large website dedicated to helping human trafficking by offering services to combat this crime. There is a hotline for support, they are building a large public data set on human trafficking in the USA, learning how trafficking works, in real time, strategies that change entire systems to specify all trafficking, and they work with law enforcement and other public and private-sector partners to help to support survivors and to prevent and disrupt human trafficking.
They also supply statistics, blogs, videos, and initiatives to help women from Latin American countries, support for survivors, and to detect businesses that are disguised as legitimate and used to traffic vulnerable woman and children. To read more you can find it here https://polarisproject.org.
There are other websites based in the US too http://humantraffickingsearch.org and http://www.endslaverynow.org – both of these are worth checking out.
In Europe, where the problem is touching all European countries, particularly with the influx of refugees, and many going missing when the reach the country they are travelling to, the European Commission have on their site, all information about how they are tackling the problem, and also projects associated with and dealing with the massive problem that is in every city and town throughout Europe – see http://ec.europa.eu/anti-trafficking.
People can get involved, simply by being aware of any suspicious behavior, activity, whether with people or businesses, or anything that just does not look right, it is always best to be vigilant, because it really is all around us, we don’t see it, but it’s happening in front of us.
It’s time for us to start looking out for each other again. How did it ever get this bad. I thought the really bad days of slavery were behind us, but sadly they are not.
Let’s start to be kind again. We have all our creature comforts, we are contented, what more do we want….it really is the truest saying that “No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.”
10.11.2014
child exploitation, FBI, human trafficking, IACP, sex trafficking
The next session I attended was On The Front Lines of Child Sex Trafficking. I somewhat dreaded this subject matter. As a parent, I cannot imagine a situation where my daughter would be kidnapped, trafficked as a prostitute, and maybe never seen again. It sounds just like the story from the movie Taken, but the reality is out there and all around us. We don’t see it, but that disgusting, murky world is out there.
This session was only 45 minutes long, but it was just enough to get us through some sobering facts, and a couple of videos to give us an idea of this crime.
Kelly Burke, IACP Program Manager for Child Protection and Juvenile Justice introduced us to the panel, and spoke of her work. The first video showed us how mothers subject their children to sex crimes, how pimps lure young teenage girls into prostitution, and how these victims are around us, sadly unnoticed.
We were told that Police Officers are taught the 3 R’s.
- Recognize – perpetrators or indicators.
- Rethink – change your mindset and look at the clues around; and
- Respond – refer to the proper Child Sex Trafficking expertise, phone someone who is an authority and can advise you of the situation.
There are six training videos available, and we were shown the first one which involved a situation on a Texas highway. An officer stops a car which is speeding. There is a male driver, a female front seat passenger and a young teenage girl in the back. The officer is suspicious, checks the drivers license, and all seems well, he asks a few questions, then lets them go.
Using the 3 R’s, we are shown the scene again, but this time the officer approaches it quite differently. He again checks the male drivers license, then asks the female front seat passenger a few questions, and this time he looks around as she is answering, and he takes in some clues that are around.
- A very nervous young girl in the back seat, who will not make eye contact on answering questions;
- The reluctance of the female front seat passenger to hand over her phone for the officer to check;
- Small packages in the back seat; and
- Spider tattoos on all three passengers in the car.
He asks the male to stand outside and go away from the car, then he questions the two females separately. On talking to the nervous girl in the back, he rings his unit and gives her name, it turns out she is a missing teenager, on further inspection in the car, he finds various sex paraphernalia and a bunch of hotel receipts. With this information he contacts a person who works with young people who have been rescued from forced prostitution. This person advises him on the next step, and will send someone over to take the girl to safety.
Part of this video also shows an interview with a young woman who was saved from this life. She said that you are beaten over and over again, and raped many times, until you are broken, and completely at the mercy of your captors.
Michael Harpster, FBI Section Chief for Violent Crimes Against Children spoke about working with Kelly over the last eighteen month; since then about 4,100 children have been recovered. Michael also strongly recommended that in the event of a situation where you see a suspicious situation with a child or chidren that may be involved in Sex Trafficking, to call someone with Child Sex Trafficking expertise. These people will understand the situation and can handle the individual involved.
Steven McCraw, Director of the Texas Dept. of Public Safety reminded folks that although ‘We are doing a great job!”…. still there are signs out there that we are missing. Most girls are looking for an opportunity to escape, and we have to recognize signs of this. There has been great success in rescuing children from prostitution, and a good success rate of taking the ‘assholes’ of the street (Steven’s word, but quite appropriate). The youngest girl that he knew of who was rescued was 13. These young girls live in fear, but the traffickers like to get young girls because they can manipulate them and fill them with fear. It is still a sad situation, but Steven is very happy that results are being made.
This session left me happy and sad – happy for the rescued young people, but sad because they have had such a traumatic time, which will no doubt scar them. It lso bothers me that this is still going on; all around us. And all for what…..greedy people who just want to use them for their own personal monetary gain – what a grim side of the human race. I really really hope that the tables are turned on the evil that causes this. Because basically, no human is born bad, and no human is born to be enslaved.
Speakers:
- Kelly Burke, Program Manager, Child Protection and Juvenile Justice, IACP, burkek@theiacp.org
- Michael Harpster, Section Chief, Violent Crimes Against Children, FBI, US Dept. of Justice, Washington DC
- Steven McCraw, Director, Texas Dept. of Public Safety, Austin TX
- Nazmia E.A. Comrie, Program Analyst, Research & Development Division, Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, US Dept. of Justice, Washington DC
Resources: