Human Trafficking - Columbus / Hilliard

2009-06-29T07:15:00.000-07:00

A new word for prostitute: Victim

Naive and vulnerable girls lured by slick-talking pimps are drugged, beaten and held hostage for sex. They are our children, and they are the latest casualties of human trafficking.

Sunday, June 28, 2009 3:29 AM
By Alan Johnson and Mike Wagner
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

COURTNEY HERGESHEIMER DISPATCH
Ashley Berner, 19, of Hilliard, left home after graduation and quickly became trapped in the underworld of human trafficking.

A year earlier, Ashley was a typical high-school student.

Ashley now lives in a shelter for victims of human trafficking and is working through the emotional and physical trauma of her experiences.

Young women forced into the sex trade often suppress their emotional trauma, but some ease their pain by journaling or talking about human trafficking and the abuse they endured.

The rusty black Chevrolet crept slowly down W. Broad Street until a stranger waved it to a stop.

The man handed the driver $50 and climbed into the back seat beside a cute young woman with brown hair and brown eyes.

Before sunrise, about 20 more strangers would do the same.

Ashley Berner, barely 18, pleaded to the driver to let her go. Three other women, who had taken her in from the streets, introduced her to the man she didn't realize was a pimp. Soon, he was beating her and threatening to kill her and harm her family if she didn't continue prostituting in the back seat of that car.

Two weeks earlier, she had been sitting in English and math classes at Hilliard Darby High School. She left home after graduation to get out on her own, and the first people she met lured her astray.

And just that fast, Ashley was trapped in an ugly underworld with no clear escape.

"I wanted out," she said. "But he told me they owned me now."

Read the rest of the article from the Columbus Dispatch.

What is Human Trafficking?

2009-03-04T11:22:00.000-08:00

Answer: Modern Day Slavery

When people talk of organized crime, they think of drugs and arms dealers: the top two illegal industries linked to organized crime. What they don’t think of, however, is #3: Human Trafficking.

According to the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA; contained in P.L. 106-386) the definition of human trafficking is as follows:

A) Sex trafficking in which a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such act has not attained 18 years of age; or

(B) the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services, through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage, or slavery.

An estimated 27 million people around the world are forced to work without pay. In the U.S. alone an estimated 300,000 + people – mostly (but not exclusively) women and children – are forced to work for free, either as sex slaves or in harsh labor conditions. But numbers are just recently beginning to be gathered. Only a small percentage of victims is counted. Ohio, especially Toledo, is considered a major hub for sex slaves, or human trafficking victims forced into prostitution. Ohio State University in Columbus currently has the largest foreign student population in the country which allows women to be brought into the U.S. legally where they are then trafficked to various prostitution rings around the country.

What isn’t widely known is that American teenagers are lured into these rings as well. Girls can simply be lured in by “friends” who invite them over for an overnight stay or by the promise of an afternoon modeling job. Many of these girls are then drugged, repeatedly raped or worse. Sadly, they are often written off as runaways or kids “caught up in the wrong crowd” - not as a victim drawn in to modern day slavery. Rahab’s Hideaway opened its doors in October 2008 to provide shelter for women who have been victims of human trafficking. It provides shelter and therapy; tutoring and job placement for those who have nowhere else to go. According to some reports, Columbus still has a way to go in recognizing trafficking victims vs. criminal prostitutes, but progress is most definitely being made.

As of the end of 2008, there were only 4 shelters in the entire U.S. that provide a safe haven for victims of human trafficking – half of those are in Ohio – Rahab’s Hideaway and Second Chance Toledo. Three more shelters in Ohio alone will open soon. (Cincinnati, Dayton, Lima) The default destination for girls and women brought in on prostitution charges seems to be incarceration. Perhaps, with the help of these organizations, trafficking victims here in Ohio can be properly recognized and therefore get the help they truly need.

Human Trafficking 101

Human Trafficking - Columbus / Hilliard

What is Human Trafficking?