Admitted Human Traffickers Got Federal Aid

Picture from KGMB News

From KITV News:

Nonprofit Aloun Foundation Got $2 Million Fed Loan
Keoki Kerr

The owners Kapolei's Aloun Farms -- who've already pleaded guilty to human trafficking some of their farm workers -- received a multimillion dollar federal loan to buy an apartment in which to house their farm employees.

Brothers Mike and Alec Sou have already pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit human trafficking for mistreating workers brought in from Thailand to work on one of Oahu's largest fruit and vegetable operations, Aloun Farms. They await sentencing in September.

Now, KITV4 News has learned a nonprofit corporation set up by the Sou brothers, the Aloun Foundation, received $2.1 million in low-interest loans from the U.S. Agriculture Department to buy a four-story Wahiawa apartment complex to house low-income farm workers.

The mortgage for 104 Lakeview Circle shows the loan deal was signed in July 2008, just before the FBI began its federal human trafficking investigation.

Tax returns filed by the nonprofit Aloun Foundation list Alec Sou as president, and his brother Mike and their mother and father as directors. The nonprofit “supports cultural and historic agricultural activities in Hawaii through providing low cost living assistance to employees working in those organizations,” according to its 2008 tax return.

"It's a real straight up deal, and it really is serving a public purpose," said Craig Watase of Mark Development, property manager for the apartment house.

All of the rental units house at least one resident who works at Aloun Farms, he said. Residents at the complex confirmed that to a reporter Monday and said most of them were Micronesian, with two families from Hawaii.

Watase said the residents here must meet federal low-income levels to qualify for subsidized rentals, paying 30 percent of their income in rent and the U.S. Department of Agriculture picking up the rest. “It’s a good thing, and it’s on the up and up. It’s federally audited and monitored,” he said.

The Sous pursued the federal loan through their nonprofit instead of their for-profit farm because non-profits have a "better chance" of winning help from the federal government, Watase said.

He said in the nearly two years he has managed the property, only employees from Aloun Farms have been tenants there, but they’ve “tried to reach out to employees of other farms.”

"I think it's interesting and a little troubling how the Sou brothers know how to work the system," said Clare Hanusz, the attorney representing 27 former Aloun Farm workers who are trafficking victims in the federal criminal case and did not live at the Wahiawa apartment complex.

"Why this would fall under the guise of a nonprofit foundation as opposed to their for-profit enterprise is potentially concerning," she said. "I don't know hy Aloun Farms wouldn't just pay a living wage so that its workers wouldn't have to use subsidized, basically federal government subsidized housing."

Sources told KITV4 News the state attorney general's office is investigating to determine whether the Sous are using the apartment owned by their nonprofit organization as an extension of their for-profit farm.

We've covered parts of this story out of Hawaii, that actually operated all over the US, in the past. The sentencing in this trial started in June, however is set to continue in September after an agreement could not be reached. I find this particular finding interesting because I think it highlights that although traffickers make efforts to prevent their abusive practices from being discovered and punished, they can also operate in general quite publicly. Traffickers can be active community members, producing goods for major grocery chains, or, in this case, federal grantees. We can never assume that just because an agricultural employer is providing goods or services to major companies or works with grant monitors of the federal government, they are not capable of being traffickers.

Landmark as first human trafficking case goes ahead in Ireland

From Irish Central:

The first human trafficking court case will go ahead in Ireland after a slew of allegations.
Some 66 allegations of sex trafficking were made in 2009 alone.

Catherine Dunne, of the Labour Party’s women section said, "In June 2008, the 'US Trafficking in Persons Report' classified Ireland for the first time as a destination country for women, men, and children trafficked for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation and forced labour.”

No one in Ireland has ever been charged with the crime of human trafficking even though 2008 saw the introduction of Criminal Law (Human Trafficking) Act 2008.

Out of the 66 allegations in 2009 only 13 were found not to involve human trafficking. Dunne commented on the lack of convictions, thus far, despite the introduction of the law.

She said “In the two years since this law has existed there have been no convictions…Ten prosecution cases have been initiated but we wait for a conviction. While this is not a criticism, we do want to note the fact that this is the case.

"We know from studies that trafficked girls and women have been identified in Ireland.
She added “We do not want this piece of legislation to be like the law against marital rape, which was enacted in 1990 but only secured the first conviction in 2002.”

At a Stormont Public Accounts Committee meeting last month assistant chief constable of the Police Service in Northern Ireland, Drew Harris, said “Girls in their early teens are being trafficked to Northern Ireland and forced into prostitution and servitude right under our noses.”

The conference brought to light chilling stories about various cases of trafficking discovered throughout Ireland.

Harris told the story of a young orphaned girl who had been trafficked through four countries. She was just one of 20 people the Police Service in Northern Ireland had discovered in 2006.

Gambino Crime Family Charged with Sex Trafficking, Other Crimes

According to a Department of Justice Press Release:

PREET BHARARA, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and GEORGE VENIZELOS, the Special Agent-in-Charge of the New York Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation ("FBI"), announced today the arrest of 14 members and associates of the Gambino Organized Crime Family of La Cosa Nostra (the "Gambino Family") on charges including racketeering, murder, sex trafficking, sex trafficking of a minor, jury tampering, extortion, assault, narcotics trafficking, wire fraud, loansharking, and illegal gambling.

DANIEL MARINO is a longtime member and is currently a Boss of the Gambino Family. In that capacity, MARINO has over 200 fully-inducted or "made" mafia members under his command, as well as hundreds of associates who commit crimes with and for the mafia. THOMAS OREFICE and ONOFRIO MODICA are currently Soldiers of the Gambino Family acting under MARINO's supervision. OREFICE and MODICA each supervise crews that include DOMINICK DIFIORE, ANTHONY MANZELLA, MICHAEL SCOTTO, MICHAEL SCARPACI, THOMAS SCARPACI, DAVID EISLER, and SALVATORE BORGIA, all of whom are charged with racketeering and racketeering conspiracy. The indictment also charges other individuals who committed crimes with and for the Gambino Family, including STEVE MAIURRO, KEITH DELLITALIA, SUZANNE PORCELLI, and ANTHONY VECCHIONE.

In addition to the racketeering charges, the defendants are charged with [among other crimes]

Sex Trafficking and Sex Trafficking of a Minor

OREFICE, DIFIORE, MANZELLA, SCOTTO, EISLER, MAIURRO, and PORCELLI are charged with sex trafficking and sex trafficking of a minor. From 2008 to 2009, the defendants operated a prostitution business where young women and girls—including an underage girl who was 15 years old at the time—were exploited and sold for sex. The defendants first recruited various young women and girls—ages 15 through 19—to work as prostitutes. The defendants then advertised the prostitution business on Craigslist and other websites. The defendants drove the women to appointments in Manhattan, Brooklyn, New Jersey, and Staten Island to have sex with clients. The defendants then took approximately 50 percent of the money paid to the young women. The defendants also made the women available for sex to gamblers at a weekly, high-stakes poker games that OREFICE and his crew ran. . .

U.S. Attorney PREET BHARARA stated: "As today's case demonstrates, the mafia is not dead. It is alive and kicking. Modern mobsters may be less colorful, less flamboyant, and less glamorous than some of their predecessors, but they are still terrorizing businesses, using baseball bats, and putting people in the hospital. Today, the Gambino Family has lost one of its leaders, and many of its rising stars have now fallen. We will continue to work with our partners at the FBI to eradicate the mafia, and to keep organized crime from victimizing the businesses, and the people, of this city."

FBI Special Agent-in-Charge GEORGE VENIZELOS stated: "In some ways, this is not the Gambino Family of John J. Gotti. But while the leadership may maintain a lower profile, this case shows that it's still about making money illegally, by whatever means. No crime seemed too depraved to be exploited if it was a money-maker, including the sexual exploitation of a 15-year-old. In truth, despite the popular fascination, it was never really about the thousand-dollar suits. It was—and is—about murder, mayhem, and money."

Mr. BHARARA praised the outstanding investigative work of the FBI. Mr. BHARARA also noted that the investigation is continuing.

Assistant United States Attorneys ELIE HONIG, STEVE KWOK, and JASON HERNANDEZ are in charge of the prosecution. The case is being handled by the Office's Organized Crime Unit.

The charges contained in the indictment are merely accusations, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

Read the Full Press Release.

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As the press release explicitly states, all actors named in this case have not been convicted and are presumed innocent. Also, while this case may highlight more sensational aspects of trafficking, it's important to keep in mind that there is no one face of traffickers, and many if not most traffickers are not involved in organized criminal syndicates. Nevertheless, I am excited to see this case for two main reasons. First, assembling prosecutable trafficking cases is extremely difficult. I am pleased to see sex trafficking charges included with the other charges and to see the trafficking aspect of the case explicitly acknowledged. Also, as this case shows, other criminal activity such as racketeering often occurs in conjuncture with trafficking, which can be a useful avenue to pursue for both criminal cases and civil litigation on behalf of survivors when trafficking charges themselves may not hold up. Second, this case is an important reminder that the United States is not exempt from human trafficking, including human trafficking cases involving organized crime. This reminder is quite timely as we await the soon to be released US State Department's 2010 Trafficking in Persons Report where the US will include a rating for itself for the first time.

The Lost Girls

From the Texas Monthly by Mimi Swartz

Most people who are aware of the existence of human trafficking think that it happens in faraway places, like war-torn countries in the former Soviet Union, Southeast Asia, or Eastern Europe. Few can imagine that slaves are brought into the U.S. to work in restaurants, factories, and sexually oriented businesses (SOBs to those in the know). In fact, across the country, tens of thousands of people are being held captive today. Depending on whom you ask, Houston is either the leading trafficking site in the U.S. or very near the top, along with Los Angeles, Atlanta, New Orleans, and New York City. . .

In recent years there have been several high-profile arrests and prosecutions in Harris County, which has some of the toughest anti-trafficking laws in the country and one of the country’s most innovative anti-trafficking task forces. In 2005 police brought down Maximino “El Chimino” Mondragon, who ran one of the nation’s largest sex-trafficking rings, in which young women from Honduras, Nicaragua, and Mondragon’s native El Salvador were forced to work as prostitutes. That same year, a sixty-year-old man named Evan Lowenstein was arrested for operating at least a dozen brothels stocked with women from Eastern Europe who had been brought into the U.S. with promises of legitimate work. He got probation and disappeared. . .

But each time a case is made, the business simply morphs and grows in a new way. Case in point: When officers in the FM 1960 area set up a task force and began shutting down massage parlors that did not have legitimate licenses to operate, the traffickers began circumventing state regulations by reclassifying their operations as “tea parlors” and, in a novel twist, “art galleries.” “We could have fifty people doing this 24/7 and still not have enough manpower,” says Skip Oliver, a captain in the Harris County Constable’s Department in Precinct 4. “You can punch a button here and get a girl from Thailand in the pipeline. We’re nibbling at a piece of the problem. We don’t even see the whole picture.” . . .

Many rescuers know that women who wind up as trafficking victims were usually abused earlier in their lives, often by a family member or a spouse; that’s what makes them so vulnerable to the traffickers’ feigned affection and false protection. But the repeated rapes that captive prostitutes endure can turn someone with low self-esteem into someone with a serious psychiatric illness. Many suffer from severe dissociative identity disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder is usually a given. Some are bipolar. Many of these conditions have similar symptoms: extreme highs, harrowing lows, paranoia, drug or alcohol abuse as self-medication, and various forms of self-destructive behavior, including self-mutilation. . .

Usually trafficking victims are profoundly ashamed of what they have been doing or believe they have failed at it, disappointing the families who depend on them for survival. Like battered spouses, they often return to their abusers. Many have no other way to make a living. . .

“They break people beyond repair,” Dottie [Lester, coordinator for the Trafficked Persons Assistance Program for YMCA International Services] says of traffickers. “If I shattered a glass and then put it back together, it wouldn’t hold water.”

Read the Full Article

Arresting traffickers, rescuing victims, and prosecuting cases are the more high profile ways to fight human trafficking. As this article points out, though, such efforts are only first steps at best. Trafficking victims and survivors require long-term services and support beyond escape and rescue. High-profile arrests and shutting down SOBs do not address the root causes or trafficking and in many cases do little to address demand. While these efforts are important, and I strongly believe we need to advocate for increased prosecution of traffickers, these efforts must not exist in isolation but instead need to be part of a holistic anti-trafficking strategy. Otherwise, they are stop-gap measures at best and potentially counterproductive or harmful at worst.

Photograph by Van Ditthavong for the Texas Monthly

Plea in Hawaii Agriculture Case

*Picture from KHON2

From the FBI:

Two Brothers Plead Guilty in Conspiracy to Hold Thai Workers in Forced Labor in Hawaii

WASHINGTON—Defendants Alec Sou and Mike Sou, co-owners of Aloun Farm, pleaded guilty on Jan.13, 2010, in federal district court in Honolulu, to conspiring to commit forced labor. The two defendants, who are brothers, each face up to five years in prison for their respective roles in a labor trafficking scheme that held Thai agricultural workers in service at Aloun Farm through a scheme of debts, threats, and restraint.

During their respective plea hearings, the defendants acknowledged that they conspired with one another and with others to hold 44 Thai men in forced labor on a farm operated by the defendants, using a scheme of physical restraint and threats of serious harm to intimidate the workers and hold them in fear of attempting to leave the defendants’ service.

“Holding other human beings in servitude against their will is a violation of individual rights that is intolerable in a free society,” stated Thomas E. Perez, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division. “This prosecution demonstrates our commitment to combating human trafficking in all its forms, vindicating the rights of trafficking victims, and bringing human traffickers to justice.”

“Labor traffickers prey on vulnerable victims and their dreams of a better life. Those who conspire to hold workers in forced labor undermine this country's promise of liberty and opportunity,” said Florence T. Nakakuni, U.S. Attorney for the District of Hawaii. “We will continue to hold accountable those who seek to enrich themselves at the expense of the freedom, rights, and dignity of others.”

In the past fiscal year, the Civil Rights Division, in partnership with U.S. Attorney’s Offices, brought a record number of human trafficking cases, including the highest number of labor trafficking cases ever brought in a single year.

The government’s case is being prosecuted by trial attorneys Susan French and Kevonne Small of the Criminal Section of the Civil Rights Division and its Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit and by Assistant U.S. Attorney Susan Cushman.

This case was investigated by FBI Special Agents Gary Brown in Honolulu and Tricia Whitehill in Los Angeles, with support from ICE Special Agents Frank Kalepa and Daniel Kenney.

Few New York State Prosecutions Despite Law

From the New York Times:

Despite a highly trumpeted New York State law in 2007 that enacted tough penalties for sex or labor trafficking, very few people have been prosecuted since it went into effect, according to state statistics.

In New York State, there have been 18 arrests and one conviction for trafficking since the law was signed by Gov. Eliot Spitzer and took effect in November 2007, according to the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services. There is one case pending in Manhattan, one in Queens and two in the Bronx.

The situation is not very different in New Jersey or roughly 30 other states with laws against human trafficking — defined as using fraud or force to exploit a person for sex or labor. A federal law passed in 2000 with life prison penalties has resulted in 196 cases with convictions against 419 people, according to the United States Department of Justice.

The scale of those numbers contrasts starkly with the 14,500 to 17,500 people the State Department estimates are brought into the United States each year for forced labor or sex.
Prosecutors like Anne Milgram, the New Jersey attorney general, and Janet DiFiore, the Westchester County district attorney, blame a lack of training.

Police officers, they said, do not recognize signs of exploitation and do not ask the right questions at an opportune time. Eager to move a case along, the police may arrest someone for promoting prostitution rather than stiffer trafficking charges. With evidence growing stale, it can be hard to upgrade charges later on, the prosecutors said.

“It’s very reminiscent where we were 30 years ago on the domestic violence stuff,” Ms. DiFiore said. “People just don’t get it yet.”

In a typical recent case, a 22-year-old woman from Mexico said she was lured to New York by her boyfriend, who promised a waitress’s job. Instead, she said she worked for his uncle in Queens as a prostitute, servicing 10 men a night across the five boroughs for $35 to $45 a trick.
Friendless, stranded on alien streets, frightened that the police would discover she was here illegally, she felt she had no choice, said the woman, who is pregnant.

“I felt so bad, so bad,” she said, drying tears as she spoke softly with the help of a translator. “I didn’t know what I could do. I was alone.”

In July, the boyfriend was arrested after, she said, he beat her so brutally that she finally fled and sought out a stranger, who led her to the police. But he was charged only with a misdemeanor assault for domestic violence.

The Mexican woman said that had she been asked, she would have told how she had been intimidated into prostitution, but the police did not press her, and she did not volunteer anything because she was afraid the boyfriend might seek revenge against her family in Mexico. Her lawyers say they are trying to get Queens prosecutors to upgrade the charges, something prosecutors say they will consider.

The police, experts say, should be asking an immigrant prostitute whether she was forced to work the streets, whether her passport was taken away, whether she was held against her will. Training sessions on such questions have been held, including one Nov. 12 in Mount Kisco, N.Y.

“If you’re looking at a frightened immigrant woman in a brothel, it doesn’t take a Ph.D. in political science to know what you’re dealing with,” said Dorchen Leidholdt, legal director for Sanctuary for Families, a Manhattan agency for battered women that is helping the Mexican woman. She runs across many police officers who do not know that a trafficking law exists, she said.

But the police often are not helped by victims, who are “taught, trained and manipulated by their exploiters not to cooperate with nor trust law enforcement,” Richard A. Brown, the Queens district attorney, said in an e-mail message. His office said that the Mexican woman told officials only that her boyfriend had punched her; she never mentioned prostitution.

If the right questions are asked, trafficking charges do result. In Westchester, a 21-year-old Hungarian immigrant told prosecutors she was deceived by her employer, Joseph Yannai, 65, author of a book profiling the world’s top chefs, into thinking she would be coming to Pound Ridge to be his personal assistant. But according to a criminal complaint, the job required sexual favors.

The woman escaped and her testimony resulted in charges against Mr. Yannai of sexual abuse and two counts of labor trafficking — one involving the Hungarian and another a Brazilian woman at the Yannai home. Under the new law, each labor trafficking count carries a prison sentence of three to seven years.

In their questioning, prosecutors learned, according to the complaint, that Mr. Yannai had deceived the Hungarian woman about the job, had limited her phone calls and offered her no spending money — acts that undergirded the trafficking charge. Mr. Yannai, who is awaiting trial, said the women “were free to come and go as they wished,” according to his lawyer, John D. Pappalardo.

On Tuesday, a Queens jury convicted David Brown, 32, of St. Albans, of sex trafficking and kidnapping. The Queens district attorney said it was the first conviction for sex trafficking since the 2007 law was passed.

Prosecutors said the defendant forced a woman to work for him as a prostitute for 12 days in August 2008 by threatening to beat her and cut up her body if she left his apartment. Witnesses testified that the woman was “sold” to the defendant for $2,000 by an ex-girlfriend.
Amy Siniscalchi, program director for My Sister’s Place in Westchester, a service agency working with seven trafficking victims, said “everybody in the field thinks that the crime of human trafficking is increasing.”

Jennifer Dreher, senior director of the anti-trafficking program at Safe Horizon, a domestic violence agency, said the world economic crisis had made desperate people more willing to believe employment schemes and had provided workers for massage parlors and brothels.
Those trafficking cases that have been brought illustrate how trafficking is different from run-of-the-mill crimes like promoting prostitution.

Last month, two Mexican immigrants — a husband and wife — were charged by federal authorities in Brooklyn with using physical violence — including cutting the victim with a knife, beating her with a brick, punching her and breaking her finger and nose — to force a young woman to work as a prostitute starting in April 2007.

Benton J. Campbell, the United States attorney in Brooklyn, described the case as “sex slavery.”
In the Queens case involving the Mexican woman, she said the police asked her only about visible bruises. Vivian Huelgo, another lawyer for Sanctuary for Families, faults them for not digging harder.

“A couple of different questions — is someone forcing you to have sex and is that sex for money — would take you down the road to a more serious crime,” she said.

The article has many good points, and I'm thrilled that the first conviction under New York State Law finally happened last week. Just giving my own view on the material in the article though, I think our problems run even deeper than just law enforcement and district attorneys understanding how to ask victims the right questions. I think there is an issue with police and prosecutors even understanding or believing there is a problem of trafficking in their areas. In a report entitled, Understanding and Improving Law Enforcement Responses to Human Trafficking, the authors conducted surveys among 3,000 state, local and municipal law enforcement agencies and found that, "The majority, between 73 and 77 percent, of local, county and state law enforcement in the random sample (n=1661) perceive human trafficking as rare or non-existent in their local communities." While the report provides for much more complex analysis of the results of the survey, that is a huge indication that even the best state laws will prove useless unless there is a more basic understanding of the problem of trafficking and an acknowledgment that it can happen pretty much anywhere.

Human Trafficking Event in Rochester, New York

Human Trafficking: Awareness & Action

December 8, 2009, 9:00 AM—4:00 PM

RIT Inn & Conference Center

5257 W. Henrietta Rd, Rochester, NY 14467

The International Institute of Buffalo, Farmworker Legal Services of NY and the NY Branch of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children are partnering to hold a conference and networking event entitled, The Human Side of Human Trafficking: Awareness & Action.

Speakers include:

• Florrie Burke, Co-Chair, Freedom Network (USA): Ms. Burke will provide an overview of Human Trafficking, victim profiles, collaborative multi-disciplinary models of response andservice, and building a community-wide response to trafficking.


• Ron Soodalter Co-Author, The Slave Next Door: Using examples from his research Mr. Soodalter will focus on the state of human trafficking and slavery in the United States andwhat is being done to address trafficking in various regions.


• John O’Brien, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of Michigan & Edward Price, Detective Sergeant, Michigan State Police—Detroit: The instructors will provide information on an actual child prostitution investigation which spanned from Michigan, Ohio, Florida and Washington D.C. and grossed over two million dollars in illegal money and assets. The instructors will discuss in detail the different methods and techniques that were used to dismantle these criminal enterprises which involved two pimps and over nine juvenile victims.

Intended audience includes government and social service providers, law enforcement members, educational staff, medical personnel, community, religious, and cultural groups, legal assistance providers and victim advocates in Upstate New York.

Register by filling out the registration form and mailing it to NCMEC/NY, 275 Lake Ave, Rochester, NY 14608 or Fax: 585-242-0717.

Download the information and registration form here.

For more information, contact: Kathy Cannon, Kcannon@ncmec.org,
585-242-0900 x 3339

Human Trafficking and the EU

On October 19th, European Union marked the EU Anti-Trafficking Day. As the European Union inches closer to adopting a treaty that could, among other things, increase the EU's anti-trafficking work, it makes sense to consider the reality of trafficking in the EU as well as the EU's role in addressing trafficking as a supranational entity.

According to an article in the AFP, "the United Nations said on Sunday [October 18th] there could be around 270,000 victims of human trafficking in the European Union and urged greater efforts to combat the illegal trade." The article goes on to report that "Authorities in Europe were aware of only a tiny proportion of the victims, said the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), estimating there were 30 times more people affected than were known about."Human trafficking is also extremely underprosectued in Europe, according to the United Nations. Bernama.com cites a "report by the Press Trust of India (PTI) [on a] study that finds that fewer people are convicted for human trafficking in Europe than for less-frequent crimes like kidnapping."

While such incredible disparities between the number of victims and the number of victims identified are a universal norm around the world, action at the EU level is vital for effectively combating slavery in Europe. Near the end of October, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Special Representative for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings, Eva Biaudet, and the Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, Ambassador Janez Lenarcic issued a statement underscoring the importance of the EU in addressing trafficking. A press release from the OSCE quotes Biaudet as saying "Fighting trafficking means having zero tolerance towards exploitation, particularly exploitation of women and children. . .If we fail to combat the increased tolerance of exploitation, the effects of the global crisis will be felt in our socio-economic development for decades to come."

The statement highlights different EU-level policies and programs that have a role in combating slavery. The report also addresses the role of the economic crisis in increasing the number of people vulnerable to trafficking, pointing to the EU's role in economic development and immigration policy, both of which impact people's vulnerability to trafficking situation. They applaud the EC Proposal for a Council Framework Decision on preventing and combating trafficking in human beings, and protecting victims for its efforts to establish an EU-level policy that focuses on victims' needs, while addressing prevention and prosecution.

The EU also hosted the Towards EU Global Action against Trafficking in Human Beings Conference in late October. Its goals were:

• "to strengthen the EU policy ands action against trafficking in a the external dimension where action previously has not been taken comprehensively,
• to contribute to development of the EU’s increasingly important partnerships with third countries and in that context a particular challenge, i.e. trafficking,
• to consult with all concerned stakeholders in view of the Action Oriented Paper,
• to collect and collate best practices and concrete proposals for action against trafficking in partnership between the ERU and third countries."

In her welcome statement to the conference, Beatrice Ask, Minister for Justice, stated "But the work done so far is not enough. We need to broaden our approach. The main purpose of this conference is to strengthen the co-operation between government administrations, international institutions and NGOs in countries of origin, transit and destination. There is a mutual dependence between us in order to effectively fight and prevent trafficking in human beings. We have to work together, and we need to step up our efforts."

Minister Ask's words are applicable to all of us involved in working to end modern-day slavery.

Kansas City, Mo. Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Commercial Sex Trafficking of a Child

According to a September 16, 2009 Department of Justice press release, a Kansas City, Mo. man pleaded guilty in federal court on Wednesday to the attempted commercial sex trafficking of a child.

Steven C. Albers, a forty-year-old insurance manager, was one of seven defendants indicted as the result of Operation Guardian Angel, an undercover law enforcement investigation targeting would-be customers of child prostitution in the Kansas City area. The indictments are part of the first federal prosecution of alleged child prostitution customers under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act.

The sting operation was conducted from March 5 to 7, 2009. The police advertised the "children" online at craigslist.org, although no children were actually involved. On March 5, Albers responded to a posting advertising "little girls available." The undercover officer told him that he had an 11-year-old and 15-year-old girl available. Albers told the officer that he would like to spend an hour with the 11-year-old, during his lunch break so that he would be able to drive from his office near the Country Club Plaza. Later he revised it to half an hour plus an extra $20 to go "bareback," i.e. to have sexual intercourse without a condom. The total price was to be $80.

The arresting officers emerged from a bedroom at the undercover house after Albers arrived and provided money to the undercover officer. Albers attempted to flee, but was apprehended in a neighboring yard.

Albers will be subject to a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in federal prison without parole, up to a sentence of life in prison without parole, and a fine of up to $250,000.

According to the website, although the Trafficking Victims Protection Act has previously been used to prosecute "pimps," these indictments are the first in the nation to charge "Johns" with attempts. At least three others arrested as part of the sting have already pleaded guilty, including a naval recruiter, a finance manager for an automotive dealership, and a truck driver.

For additional information from the sources of this article, please visit the following sites:
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/mow/news2009/albers.ple.htm
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/mow/news2009/oflyng.ple.htm
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/mow/news2009/childers.ple.htm
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/mow/news2009/cockrell.ple.htm
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/mow/news2009/childers.ind.htm

Wisconsin Couple Re-sentenced in Trafficking Case

From the DOJ:

Wisconsin Couple Sentenced for Forcing a Woman to Work as Their Domestic Servant for 19 Years

Jefferson Calimlim Sr. and his wife, Elnora Calimlim, both medical doctors in Milwaukee, Wis., were each sentenced today to 72 months in prison for forcing a woman to work as their domestic servant and illegally harboring her for 19 years in their Brookfield, Wis., residence.

The defendants, initially sentenced on Nov. 16, 2006, to four-year prison terms each, were re-sentenced today, after the Court of Appeals identified legal errors in the initial sentencing and remanded to the trial court for re-sentencing.

On May 26, 2006, Jefferson Calimlim Sr. and Elnora Calimlim were convicted by a Milwaukee federal jury for using threats of serious harm and physical restraint against a Filipina to obtain her services, in violation of federal law. Jefferson Calimlim Jr. was convicted of harboring an illegal alien.

According to evidence presented at trial, Jefferson Calimlim Sr. and his wife recruited and brought the victim from the Philippines to the U.S. in 1985 when she was 19 years old. In September 2004, federal law enforcement officers responding to a tip removed the victim, then age 38, from the Calimlim’s residence through the execution of a federal search warrant. The victim testified that for 19 years she was hidden in the Calimlim’s home, forbidden from going outside and told that she would be arrested, imprisoned and deported if she was discovered.

"Our Constitution promises freedom to all," said Loretta King, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division. "The defendants denied the victim the basic right to her freedom. The Department of Justice is committed to prosecuting those who prey on vulnerable members of our society and hold them in modern-day slavery."

"Human Trafficking is a form of modern day slavery and is simply not acceptable. No person should ever be forced to live in fear, virtual isolation and servitude," said Acting U.S. Attorney Michelle L. Jacobs for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. "The prosecution of human trafficking offenses is a top priority of the Justice Department, and our office is committed to aggressively pursuing these cases."

In Fiscal Year 2008, the Department brought a record number of human trafficking cases, including both the highest number of both sex trafficking and labor trafficking cases ever brought in a single year.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Tracy Johnson and Trial Attorney Susan French of the Civil Rights Division’s Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit. The case was jointly investigated by the Milwaukee Office of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the FBI.

We use this case a lot when we conduct trainings in Western New York, specifically because the jury was able to convict two people for trafficking and maintaining control of one woman for 19 years. It shows that juries are able to understand the element of this crime that is often most difficult to prove: force, fraud or coercion. Essentially, what was the intent of the trafficker and the mindset of the victim? In this case, to prove that the traffickers were able to keep control for 19 years means this was an exceptionally well-organized case and important to the counter-trafficking movement in general both on a court and law enforcement level, and on the level of average citizens who took part in the jury.

On the down side, this woman was held and forced to serve this couple for 19 years and her traffickers are now only serving 6 years each. Despite the positive fact that this couple was actually convicted for trafficking (as in the infrequent situation that traffickers are actually convicted of the exact crime as opposed to other related charges), the traffickers lose their freedom for not even half of the time they deprived the survivor of her freedom. This speaks to the way US law treats labor trafficking cases. Time to reconsider?

A Shocking Story

By Ayesha Ahmad
September 14, 2008

The UK media has recently covered two instances of human trafficking.

Police Raids
The first story reported a series of raids involving over 50 polices forces across England and Wales. Some 500 people were arrested and almost 200 people including women and children were, as the newspaper reported, “released”.

The next day the story had disappeared from the media despite the enormous scale of the police operation. The operation was conducted to crack down on human trafficking, but the perspective is still that the way to do this is blaming the trafficked rather than the traffickers.

What happened to the men, women and children who were released? One can only assume that they were deported. And upon returning home, there may be no emotional reunion with their family; instead, these people who had already endured so much exploitation and abuse are sometimes and not uncommonly placed straight back into the hands of the traffickers linked to the gang masters in the UK that were imprisoned.

Imprisonment of trafficking victims or even traffickers does not erase the “debt” that will have issued to each trafficked victim. This is a debt that either has to be repaid in money or death. Returning a trafficked victim to their home country is only a continuation of their journey, the journey that they were enticed into with the prospect of providing a “better life” for their family.

Forced Labor
The second story in the media recently reported a shocking murder trial of four men who were part of a trafficking gang in Wales, UK. All four men were found guilty of manslaughter following the death of a Vietnamese man. The report describes how the 44 year old was dumped in a hospital with severe head injuries. A large police operation followed his subsequent death, tracing back to the perpetrators and revealing the following chain of events.

After entering the country illegally via the Ukraine and entering the UK in the back of a lorry, the trafficked man was provided work in an illegal cannabis factory. Two months later he was accused of using the produce and tortured before being left at the hospital entrance.

The focus of the police operation concentrated on prosecuting those responsible for the man’s death, yet no charges were made against them for trafficking. In fact, the issue of trafficking was entirely bypassed except for mentioning the illegality of the victim in the country.

Again, the traffickers are not viewed as responsible for trafficking people, which brings attention to an apparent societal lack of comprehension of the vulnerability rendered by poverty and war that allows traffickers to deceive or coerce their victims. The first step in changing the opinion of society, including that of the media and how the media portrays human trafficking, must stem from distinguishing between the traffickers and the trafficked in terms of vulnerability and violation.

In the above two examples, both parties were viewed as criminals. This approach has got to change.

South Africa: Bill to Allow for Prosecution of All Forms of Human Trafficking

From allAfrica.com:

By Gabi Khumalo
August 15, 2008

Legislation is being formulated that will allow for the prosecution of all forms of human trafficking.

"The draft Bill (the Trafficking in Persons Bill) allows for all forms of human trafficking to be prosecuted including labour exploitation and not only sexual exploitation," said National Prosecuting Authority's (NPA's) Sexual Offences and Community Affairs (SOCA) Unit, National Co-ordinator, Malebo Kotu-Rammopo.

She said that in the absence of specific legislation criminalising the offence, the NPA has encountered unique problems in ensuring an adequate response to the occurrences of this phenomenon.

"Prosecutions have proceeded on an ad hoc basis overtly demonstrable to the facts such as kidnapping, indecent assault and rape, which do not individually attract as heavy sentences as a specific trafficking in persons would impose," Ms Malebo Kotu-Rammopo said.

The absence of legislation also limits prosecutors to deal with only the perpetrator directly linked to the offences, while excluding the perpetrators behind the scenes, which is often an organised crime activity.

Giving an update on the country's strategy to counter human trafficking, Ms Kotu-Rammopo said last year the country had signed and ratified the United Nations Convention Against Translational Organised Crime and the Parlemo Protocol.

The protocol aims to prevent, suppress and punish human trafficking, especially among women and children.It also obliges member states to criminalise trafficking in persons, investigate and prosecute traffickers as well as undertake border control measures.

The SOCA, together with Government and civil society, has also established an Inter-sectoral Task Team to develop a programme to co-ordinate a comprehensive strategy to counter human trafficking.

The strategy, which started after the government received the protocol in 2007, would lead to the adoption of a National Action Plan as required by the Palermo Protocol.

Read the full article

Philippines: Cagayan de Oro, Bukidnon Top Trafficking Cases

A Traditional Sunday Meeting of Filipino Maids in Hong Kong

From the Sun Star:

By Annabelle L. Ricalde
Tuesday, July 29, 2008

CASES of human trafficking this year are high in Bukidnon province and Cagayan de Oro compared to other places in Northern Mindanao, said the Commission on Filipinos Overseas (CFO) Task Force Against Human Trafficking.

As of June 2008, 38 percent of human trafficking victims came from Bukidnon and 35 percent from Cagayan de Oro, CFO data show. Another 20 percent of the victims live in Gingoog City, 16 percent in Ozamis City, and 11 percent Misamis Oriental.

The figures only account for the cases handled by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD)-Northern Mindanao, so the actual number of 138 victims could be higher, said lawyer Golda Myra Roma of the CFO.

Roma said that of the total number of victims, 117 are minors and almost all of them are females.

She said women are more preferred by human traffickers because of "the availability of the labor force for women."

The "jobs" offered for women often include forced prostitution, while others land into forced labor, slavery, servitude, or the removal of organs, she added.

Senator Jinggoy Ejercito Estrada meantime said the number of unemployed workers falling prey to human trafficking syndicates has risen in the last two years.

Estrada, concurrent chairman of the Senate Committee on Labor, Employment and Human Resources Development, said that international syndicates have been preying on desperate workers who are trying to get employment abroad.

Meanwhile, Roma named Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Brunei and Japan as the top haven of trafficked persons from the Philippines. She said these countries do not have comprehensive laws against human trafficking, unlike the Philippines.

She said that cases of human trafficking in the country have been going down since 2006, although the number remains alarming.

She said that the victims often would lose interest in pursuing the case because of the delayed and long process of the prosecution.

Read the full article

Ukraine takes steps to curb trafficking

From the Kyiv Post:

With no money, no husband, a sick mother and two children, Natalia became an ideal target for a human trafficking network that has claimed an estimated 100,000 victims in independent Ukraine.

Natalia’s journey took the 38yearold woman from her hometown in western Ukraine, to a brothel in Western Europe for six months and back again to her native country, where she is now working at a printing house.
While Ukraine continues to be a haven for traffickers, the situation is not entirely bleak and there is progress to report.

According to a recent U.S. State Department Trafficking in Persons Report, the Ukrainian government is doing a better job of punishing convicted traffickers, both through convictions and longer prison sentences. The government is also improving its prosecution of labor traffickers, training the judiciary and carrying out prevention strategies.

However, the State Department criticized the Ukrainian government for not doing enough to help victims. A weak witness protection program and a bias against sex trafficking victims which discourages many from testifying in courts, according to the report.

For example, Natalia, which is not her real name, is afraid to press charges against the woman who deceived her and then recruited her into the network where she was sexually exploited...

From 2000 to 2008, IOM assisted 5,214 Ukrainians who were trafficked for sexual and labor exploitation.

Jeffrey Labovitz, chief of mission in Ukraine for IOM, says trafficking in Ukraine remains an “acute problem” and says the government needs to take more responsibility to decrease the number of trafficked victims.

“They need to go after the big fish,” says Labovitz, speaking about the lack of prosecution against the traffickers, who adds that weak prosecution of traffickers prevents Ukraine from getting a top ranking for combating the problem.

The organization helps victims reintegrate into society and provides them with shelter, medical, psychological, legal and job placement assistance. It also runs five centers for migrant advice throughout the country where Ukrainians can get information on workers’ rights, contract terms, visas and fraudulent schemes used to lure workers abroad.

Labovitz believes that Ukraine has, over the last few years, improved its efforts to deal with trafficking by setting up a countertrafficking department within the Interior Ministry that employs over 300 employees. He also points to the statistics and says 90 percent of Ukrainians understand what trafficking is, a significant increase over the last five years, when only 60 percent of Ukrainians knew what trafficking was, he says.

Labovitz says partnerships to reduce human trafficking are crucial. “You need the government, civic society, corporate Ukraine and international organizations working together to get the maximum effect,” he said. Joint efforts remain essential to tackling this problem and over the years more partnerships have been formed between the public and private sector.
Partnership programs between international organizations and the government have helped Ukraine rise from the Tier 2 watch list, a type of “red flag,” to Tier 2, a slight improvement...

New partnerships between the public and private sector are a recent phenomenon and more companies are climbing on board to raise awareness of trafficking. A new campaign was launched by Ukrainian oil company Galnaftogas in February 2008 that includes countertrafficking billboards at 12 OKKO gas stations in Lviv, Volyn and Zakarpattya oblasts warning travelers of human trafficking. In addition, three leading mobile companies Kyivstar, Life, MTS, have joined forces and set up a tollfree number “527” that provides information and assistance on trafficking to callers. Microsoft Ukraine has also donated software to seven nongovernmental organizations meant to train trafficked victims and help them with their job skills. MTV Ukraine has been involved by donating airtime for public service announcements informing viewers of the dangers of working abroad...

Natalia’s story

Despite a steadily improving economy that is reducing financial desperation, Natalia’s story is still all too common in Ukraine. Millions of people still remain mired in poverty or lowwage jobs in tiny villages scattered throughout the nation.

The IOM, which assisted Natalia, set up an interview between her and the Kyiv Post on the condition that her real name and other identifying information not be used. She is a woman with shortbrown hair, skyblue eyes and two gold teeth. Wearing an all-white crochet dress and a gold cross around her neck, her nails are not painted and her makeup is minimal.

Like many deceived victims, Natalia said she was destitute when a young woman approached her as she was working in a local market in her hometown. The woman asked if she was interested in working abroad.

“She promised good money,” says Natalia in a shaky voice, her mascara watering as tears begin to trickle down her face.

“This woman knew I had no money, no husband, a sick mother and two children and she knew I was desperate,” she says. Natalia was told she would work in the home of a family in a Western European nation.

It turned out to be a lie.

“When I arrived, I asked where the family was, where the washing machine was and all the other things I would need to help around the house. Suddenly a large man dressed in black threw cheap lingerie at me and said I had to work to pay off the cost of my travel, and that’s when I knew I had been trafficked. I knew I had been trafficked on the first day.”

Natalia worked with five other women from Ukraine and Moldova in a small apartment, where she was forced to service up to four men a day, she says. She worked in slavelike conditions for six months until she got pregnant and begged to be sent back to Ukraine by one of her customers, who refused to pay for an abortion. The abortion had to wait until she returned to Ukraine.

*Photo courtesy of IOM Mission in Ukraine

Australia: All-Out Bid to Emancipate Nation's Sex Slaves

From the Sydney Morning Herald:

By Matthew Benns and Heath Gilmore

Government, police and welfare agencies are joining forces in an unprecedented bid to expose and eliminate Australia's sex slave trade.

Representatives of more than 20 organisations and government departments met to discuss ways to combat the trade in human lives at a summit in Canberra two weeks ago. And the Federal Government has committed $20million a year to halt the practice as well as doubling the Australian Federal Police's sex trafficking department's budget.

Authorities have identified more than 100 women as sex slaves, imported into Australia to work as prostitutes, since 2004. They often have their passports seized by brothel owners and must work to pay off so-called "debts", as high as $45,000, for the opportunity to work in Australia.

Brad Halse, who represented the Salvation Army at the summit, said: "It was organised by the Attorney-General's department to brainstorm ways to stop human trafficking and find ways to share knowledge."

The number of sex slaves in Sydney looking for help prompted the Salvation Army to open a 10-bed refuge for illegally trafficked sex workers. It plans to take the pilot scheme nationwide.

The first sentencing under tough new sex slavery laws in NSW is set down for the Downing Centre District Court next week. Convicted Sydney sex-slave trader Trevor McIvor and his Thai-born wife Kanokporn Tanuchit plan to launch a high-profile fight to avoid a possible 25-year jail term.

They are awaiting the outcome of a High Court appeal on a Victorian sex slavery case. The High Court is expected to hand down its judgment on the Victorian Wei Tang case by the end of August in a critical test of the nation's sex slavery laws.

The High Court will be asked whether the sex workers are employed under contract, similar to footballers, or are slaves whose finances and every movement are controlled by masters.

The McIvor case is one of seven trafficking cases before the courts, three of which have gone to appeal.

Read the full article

Alleged Leader of Trafficking Ring in Court for Bond Hearing

From Pal-Item.com:

INDIANA, United States- A woman accused of being the leader of a human trafficking and prostitution ring believed to have connections to Richmond is expected to have her bail hearing completed this afternoon.

Yong Williams, 50, will have her bail hearing continued in the U.S. District Court in Covington, Ky., a court clerk said this morning.

The clerk said Williams was in court at 8:30 a.m. along with 63-year-old Myong Rogers. Rogers is charged with accepting customers' credit cards to pay for prostitution.Williams admitted to undercover agents this week that she drove 40,000 miles in seven months delivering Korean women to massage parlors that are believed to have offered sexual services, according to The Cincinnati Enquirer and NKY.com, a northern Kentucky Web site.

Williams acted as a “bank” by collecting, holding and distributing money to and from the owners of the massage parlors across the nation, including parlors in the region, according to court documents.

Read the full article

Canada Sued over Human Trafficking Case

From United Press International:

LAVAL, Quebec- The first two people Canada charged for human trafficking are suing the government and police in Quebec for $5 million after the charges were dropped.

In May 2007, Nichan Manoukian and Manoudshag Saryboyadjian were charged with regard their Ethiopian nanny, who had worked for them for eight years in Lebanon before moving to Montreal in 2004, The Gazette newspaper reported.

The charges claimed the nanny had been denied access to a telephone, not allowed to leave the house and threatened with deportation if she spoke to authorities.

However, neighbors told police they saw no evidence the woman was being held against her will and reports at the time suggested the nanny had been coached in her claims in order to gain refugee status, the newspaper said.

In December 2007, a crown prosecutor dropped the criminal charges as the couple demanded a public apology.

The lawsuit against the government, Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the city of Laval police claims unfounded arrest, psychological damage, legal fees for both the criminal and civil case, loss of income, loss of reputation and loss of dignity, honor and integrity, the newspaper said.

Thai Ministry Proposes Anti-Trafficking Day

By Penchan Charoensuthipan

From the Bangkok Post:

Thailand- The Social Development and Human Security Ministry will ask the cabinet to declare June 5 National Anti-Human Trafficking Day. The date is when a new anti-human trafficking law comes into effect.

Panita Kamphu na Ayutthaya, director-general of the ministry's social development and welfare department, said yesterday that the ministry would seek a green light from the cabinet to make June 5 National Anti-Human Trafficking Day.

The ministry will also kick off its serious campaigns against human trafficking on that day. The new anti-human trafficking law will help women, children and men who have become victims of prostitution, pornography, sexual abuse, forced labour and forced organ trade. It intensifies punishment against traffickers, spares victims from prosecution, provides victims with legal rehabilitation and conceals their identities and those of their families.

Saisuree Chutikul, an activist against trafficking in children and women, said concerned officials would have to enforce the new law effectively as they had been poor at nailing traffickers.

Victims Defend the Accused

A good article that discusses the attachment of trafficking victims to their traffickers. The only issue I have is that, as we have seen in several other articles, smuggling is confused with human trafficking. Also it's good to see Andrea Bertone get interviewed, go visit her excellent website.

By Brian Donohue

From NJ.com:

Last September, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested two men and a woman from Togo who they said smuggled 14 girls and young women from West Africa, forced them to work without pay at hair-braiding salons in Newark and East Orange, and kept them in line with threats and beatings.

It was, one agent said, a case of modern-day slavery.

Now, four of the alleged victims say they weren't exploited at all.

Rather, they described the three people charged in the case, Lassissi Afolabi, 44, Akouavi Kpade Afolabi, 39, and Dereck Hounakey, 30, as benevolent parent figures who rescued them from misery in their African village, where drinking water was hauled from a stream each day and their parents struggled to feed their families.

They say they long to return to the hair salons -- even if they weren't paid for their long hours performing intricate hair weaves. And worse, they say, their parents in Africa are blaming them for the downfall of the three jailed suspects, who had been sending money to the workers' families before the salons were shut.

When she calls home, says one 21-year old woman, her parents blame her for disappointing the village, then they hang up on her.

"I can't take it any more," said the woman, who, like all of those interviewed requested her name be withheld because she is a witness in an active criminal investigation.

"Before, we were happy," she added, shaking and visibly nervous as she spoke. "Now we are not happy. My life is going to hell."

Prosecutors and social workers cast doubt on the women's statements, noting such victims remain vulnerable long after they are pulled from abusive situations. They also fear the women may have been coerced to protect the suspects, or have developed a psychological attachment to them.

Nonetheless, no one involved in human trafficking can recall a case, in New Jersey or elsewhere, in which victims have launched such a defense of their alleged abusers.

Their account shines a rare light into the complex world investigators and prosecutors navigate battling human trafficking -- where toughened U.S. laws and hard evidence often collide with complex victim pathologies and conflicting cultural and economic norms.

"This is not an unusual case, although it's complicated, and it's heart-wrenching for these girls," said Andrea Bertone, executive director of Humantrafficking.org, an anti-trafficking organization in Washington, D.C. "They don't think of themselves as victims, but our law defines them as such," she said.

"It makes it difficult for prosecutors emotionally, but our laws are very clear: You can't bring them here to work and keep them in these conditions."

Read the full article

Human Trafficking in Zambia

By Kasuba Mulenga

From the Zambia Daily Mail:

Forty-two Congolese nationals on a human trafficking mission to South Africa have been intercepted and detained by the Immigration Department in Lusaka.

Immigration Department public relations officer, Mulako Mbangweta, said in Lusaka yesterday that 26 of those arrested in Lusaka last week were yesterday repatriated to the Democratic Republic of Congo while 16 were still in detention in Kabwe.

“We could not detain the Congolese nationals who were arrested in Lusaka because most of them are women with children as young as six months old,” Ms Mbangweta said.

She said the ones in Kabwe would remain in detention until the department completed its investigations. Those repatriated were arrested in Lusaka’s Kanyama Township some five days ago.“

From the interviews we have conducted so far, they look like they were being trafficked to South Africa. When people are being trafficked, they do not know where they are going and where they are,” she said.

Immigration officers arrested 16 Congolose nationals in Kabwe last week and picked up leads from them that another larger group had proceeded to Lusaka.

An unknown group of human traffickers is behind the scheme to move the Congolese nationals to South Africa.

Read the full article



More info on human trafficking law in Zambia from the U.S. Department of State:

There were reports that persons were trafficked to, from, and within the country. The law prohibits the trafficking of any person for any purpose, but it does not define trafficking. Persons convicted of trafficking were subject to a term of imprisonment from 20 years to life. The law had not been used to prosecute a case of trafficking at year's end. Convictions of the crimes of abduction, assault, or seeking to have sex with a minor could be punished with sentences up to life imprisonment with hard labor.

The government did not collect or maintain data on the extent or nature of trafficking in the country; however, trafficking, particularly in the form of child prostitution was believed to be significant. Female citizens were trafficked within the country and to other parts of Africa and to Europe, and the country was used as a transit point for regional trafficking of women for prostitution. Traffickers fraudulently obtained Zambian travel documents for their victims before proceeding to other destinations. During the year there were reliable reports that women were trafficked to the country for commercial sex work.

Through its social welfare agencies, the government provided counseling, shelter, and protection to victims of child prostitution or referred victims to NGOs that provided such services. There was no formal screening or referral process. In some cases victims have been placed in protective custody at rehabilitation centers or victim support shelters operated by NGOs.

When government officials understand that individuals are victims of trafficking, they do not treat victims as criminals. In identified cases, victims have not been detained, jailed, deported, or prosecuted for violations of other laws. When trafficking investigations have substantiated allegations, the government has encouraged victims to assist with investigation and prosecution. The government did not have its own means of protecting victims and witnesses; however, it arranged for protective custody and security protection through facilities operated by NGOs.

I wonder why in the above article the journalist reports that the trafficking victims being "detained"? Will they be charged with violating other laws as seems possible from the Department of State's report? In what cases does the Zambian government prosecute trafficking victims and does this make sense within the scope of how other countries have structured their human trafficking law? Because one of the underlying factors of trafficking is coercion and deceit, is it just to charge trafficking victims for a crime they did not necessarily intend to commit? I think not.

And lastly, how can you effectively prosecute traffickers if the law doesn't define what trafficking is? That having been said, there has been one conviction since the human trafficking law and the government is making efforts to combat trafficking, but there is clearly a long way to go.



From the Department of State 2007 Trafficking in Persons Report:

Zambia's government sustained a weak anti-trafficking law enforcement effort over the reporting period. Zambia prohibits all forms of trafficking through a 2005 amendment to its penal code, which prescribes penalties of 20 years to life in prison - penalties that are sufficiently stringent and commensurate with those for rape.

The statute does not, however, define trafficking or set out the elements of the offense, thus limiting its utility. The government obtained its first conviction under this statute during the reporting period, but it took minimal additional law enforcement action against traffickers exploiting Zambian children.

During the year, the government, with outside technical help, began drafting a comprehensive anti-trafficking law and policy. In March, police in Serenje arrested a man for attempting to sell his 10-year old son for the equivalent of $215. In January 2007, the High Court found him guilty of trafficking under the 2005 penal code amendment, and sentenced him to 20 years in prison.

In April 2006, immigration officials detained two Chinese women suspected to be trafficking victims as they attempted to board a flight to London using forged travel documents; their handler escaped before he could be taken into custody.