During a 2014 Minnesota conference that brought together more than 200 people throughout the state who are attempting to combat trafficking and bring better services to survivors, a group of law enforcement officers gathered to talk about the challenges they face. They were honest about why this is a difficult battle. Sgt. Grant Snyder, Minneapolis,…
trafficking
trafficking
LAW: How Far We’ve Come Since 1992
In 1992, Andy Lugar was a 29-year-old Brooklyn-based attorney when a DEA narcotics team asked for, and got permission, to hit a house they’d been targeting for suspected drug trafficking. Shortly after the bust, however, Lugar got a call from tough New York officers who could barely talk. They were traumatized by what they found…
trafficking
TIPS: How the Law Finds Traffickers
In October 2012, a woman sent an email to St. Paul law enforcement indicating that her 15-year-old granddaughter had been in a particular house in the neighborhood where suspicious activity had taken place. While hanging out playing pool in the basement, young girls started getting late night calls on cell phones and and an older…
trafficking
The Uncomfortable Story of Trafficking
At the first-ever statewide gathering of Minnesota professionals engaged in helping to tackle the sex trafficking industry (April 24-25, 2014) so many people turned up that the event was moved from the resort’s largest conference room space to the tennis court facility. Though I have read many stories, and heard several survivors talk about their…
trafficking
Why This Project?
None of us would claim that it is okay for a middle-aged businessman to have sex with an abused 13-year-old girl. Yet it happens, in any American city, every day. According to the FBI, the sex trafficking industry in the United States is a multibillion-dollar industry, in which traffickers target, manipulate, and torture a steady…
trafficking
Who Buys Sex?
Who wants to have sex with underage victims? Might be someone you know. The people who pay to have sex with abused youth are more “normal” than you might think. Some think it is a victimless crime — that they are helping a girl earn money. Some think the girls enjoy being with them. Some…
trafficking
Where Does It Happen?
Oklahoma “What the general public often doesn’t realize is that the average age of recruitment is between 12 and 14,” Rep. Pam Peterson, R-Tulsa Ohio Two cousins were walking to a neighborhood Wendy’s when they were abducted and forced into prostitution. They were rescued after a driver at a Michigan truck stop suspected they were trafficking…
trafficking
The Demand
Gather a large group of men together (Super Bowl, All-Star games, oil fields, political and other conventions) and you will tend to see a spike in trafficking activity, as traffickers transport girls in order to meet high demand for sex. The Super Bowl has the country’s highest incidences of trafficking. According to Forbes magazine, 10,000…
trafficking
Supporters
THANKS to these supporters who helped fund the information here about sex trafficking during our month-long IndieGoGo campaign. (in order of contribution to the cause) Mary Warner (thanks for spreading the word in social media!) Trish Greene (thanks for spreading the word in social media!) Judy LaVercombe Marilyn Morrissette Alison Yee (thanks for spreading the…
trafficking
Finding the Supply
Do You Know How It Happens? It can be easy to as a community to dismiss victims as “girls wanting attention” or “easy money.” But do you know what vulnerable youth see and hear when a trafficker approaches them? Do you know what happens to girls who become targets? The five-step process a trafficker uses…