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Our team of experts traveled to Laredo and Brownsville in Texas to train local experts along the border on best practices in their fight against trafficking. Alongside partners Detective Joseph Scaramucci and Human Trafficking Information and survivor leader Allie Franklin, we help law enforcement understand how to identify sex and labor trafficking operations, pursue data-driven investigations, and target both traffickers and buyers, all while adopting a trauma-informed, culturally-competent approach to victims. Our team was invited to share their expertise with over 15 agencies from rural areas of the Rio Grande Valley because our collaborative, multi-disciplinary approach can be scaled to any jurisdiction. In addition to participants and faculty, we were honored to partner this time with Refugee Services of Texas – RGV, BCFS Health and Human Services Common Thread, United Way of Southern Cameron County, and Cameron County District Attorney’s Office.
We often have a predisposed idea of what a trafficker looks like, and sometimes it isn’t what we think. Sometimes the exploiters are high-powered or well-known members of our communities who use their names and power to control and exploit victims. Here are some recent examples of powerful celebrities involved in trafficking. We expect to see other cases and applaud brave survivors for speaking out against injustice.
DJ Bassnectar. The DJ solicited underage girls through various channels, including Twitter, fan clubs, and charitable initiatives like the BeInteractive amBASSadors program. He gave the girls free tickets to his concerts, and through those relationships, invited them to his hotel room, where he coerced them into engaging in sex for money.
Marilyn Manson The actress Esmé Bianco, best known for her role as Ros on Game of Thrones, filed suit against Marilyn Manson. Not only did he defraud her with the promise of a work-related project that did not exist, but she was also expected to stay at his home and was deprived of food during her four-day stay; she was given drugs and alcohol.
TI and Tiny The number of accusers against Clifford “T.I.” Harris and Tameka “Tiny” Harris continues to increase as more women come forward with claims of sex crimes and a recent allegation of sex trafficking. One woman alleges that T.I. and a male friend drugged and raped her in Miami during the 2010 Memorial Day weekend, the report said. Another woman describes a similar experience of being “drugged” and “sex trafficked,” which ultimately led to her being trafficked by the couple in multiple states.When we use the term “power” in human trafficking, it is not necessarily about celebrities and fame. Sometimes local governors, priests, or teachers have much more power over potential victims than famous musicians. As part of our national work, we monitor daily cases of human trafficking across every US state. Here are the cases from the last monthLearn More >>
Texas man accused of human trafficking in sting at Citrus Park hotel Our federal partners in Tampa requested analytical support for the case against Jamel Muldrew, of Houston. We are proud to say that Muldrew was federally indicted for human trafficking. This case was brought as part of the Tampa Bay Human Trafficking Task Force of the Middle District of Florida, one of 13 such task forces in the country to receive grant funding from the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance. The Task Force is a collaboration of local, state, and federal law enforcement agents working together with organizations to detect, investigate, and prosecute human trafficking in the Tampa Bay area. This includes trafficking of minors, forced labor, transnational sex trafficking, and sex trafficking of adults by force, fraud, or coercion
We partner with survivor leaders to eradicate human trafficking in the United States and train others to do the same in the most victim-centered, intelligence-driven manner possible.
Our work is both for and guided by survivors at the center of every step we take. We work closely with sex and labor trafficking survivors from trainings to outreach, law enforcement engagement, and uplifting survivor-led programs and projects. This approach not only ensures accuracy in our work, but it also minimizes trauma through the inclusion of survivor voices and experiences. We are proud to highlight some of the leaders who help us combat human trafficking across the country. We are proud of the progress we and our partners have made, and excited to do even more in 2021! Check out the full Impact Report here.
Our CEO, Rochelle Keyhan spoke to Fox News about human trafficking in Illicit Massage Businesses. “A lot of the networks we’ve identified in our work at Collective Liberty has been following the networks… When parlors are connected to multiple parlors, and business registrations, they’re advertised on commercial sex sites, and they’re offering things like four hands massage – in the context of offering commercial sex, it’s highly likely that it’s a trafficking network.”
Check out our recent blog posts on Massage Parlor Trafficking: FACTS AND STATISTICS, Indicators of massage parlor trafficking, and Recruiting women into Illicit Massage Business. Learn More >>
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