The Facts

Sex trafficking is the second-largest criminal industry in the world, after drugs and arms, and the fastest growing.   The U.S. government estimates that each year as many as 900,000 people (mostly young women and girls) around the world are enslaved as laborers or sex workers. Seventeen to eighteen thousand of them are brought to the United States each year and held against their will.   That number does not reflect the number of domestic females that are trafficked within the United States.

American teens usually turn to prostitution as a result of desperation or manipulation by adult pimps who promise love, money and glamour.   These girls are unaware of the dangers they face, which include constant violence from pimps and johns, and extreme difficulty exiting the control of a pimp.

Approximately 600,000 children are believed to be at-risk for sexual exploitation in the U.S. Most prostituted women/girls have endured sexual abuse at the hands of a trusted family member or close friend and studies indicate that abused children are 28 times more likely to be arrested for sex trafficking than those who were not abused. Close to 450,000 children run away from home each year and one out of every three teens on the street will be trafficked within 48 hours of leaving home.

It has been said that every ill that society has can be found in the prostituted woman; homelessness, drug and alcohol addiction, illiteracy, abortion, sexual abuse, rape, domestic violence, suicidal tendencies and child welfare issues.   That does not mean that every prostituted woman has every vice.   However, this does indicate why they are usually very complex people and that it takes a very long time for their healing to be complete.  

For example, it is not unusual that if a woman or girl has been trafficked for only two to three years that she has endured more than a dozen abortions at the hands of her traffickers.   Most of us know someone who has had at least one abortion or possibly two and the trauma that they have encountered in trying to recover.   Or we know someone who has been raped and the painful recovery process they have gone through.   Trafficked women and girls are raped repeatedly multiple times per day.  

Fifteen percent of all suicide attempts involved those engaged in prostitution and seventy-five percent of all people who are prostituted either attempt or commit suicide. It is very important for the non-therapist to see the warning signs, be able to apply suicide prevention first aid and then get them to a professional for help.

Because hard-core pimped women and girls endure a greater level of trauma than the average person, the traditional programs of recovery often are unsuccessful.   RM is working with government officials, the police department, non-profit organizations and universities to develop a comprehensive holistic program that addresses their special needs and allows them to transition back into society as independent and fully functioning adults.

Definition of Human Trafficking

In 2000, the U.S. Congress passed a landmark piece of legislation that, for the first time, recognized the plight of those who have been sold around the world.   The Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) [18 U.S.C. Sections 1589-1594] no longer saw women and girls who have been prostituted as criminals but instead as victims.   TVPA provides prevention efforts, assistance for victims, and the prosecution of offenders.

The difference between smuggling and trafficking lies in a person's freedom of choice.   An individual may choose be to smuggled into a country but the situation changes if the person then becomes exploited by taking away their freedom.

Three Elements of Trafficking

Process
Recruiting, harboring, moving, obtaining, or maintaining a person

Means  
By force, fraud or coercion

End
For involuntary servitude, debt bondage, slavery or sex trade

A Trafficker's Profits

A trafficker in the Washington, D.C. area generally makes $3,000 per woman/girl a week. Multiply that by 52 weeks in the year and he/she is making more than $150,000. The group of women that the trafficker has is called his/her stable and there are usually six to eight women/girls in his/her stable at a time.   Now, do the math, and that adds up to $1,248,000 a year of unreported cash per trafficker! It is very unlikely that the women/girls get any of the profits and they are not treated well while in the trafficker's care.