Introduction
Human sex trafficking is the most lucrative secret crime in United States. While the billion-dollar sector of sex enslavement has recently received increased attention, it is now regarded a form of contemporary slavery. Individuals involved and buyers are both concealed in plain sight, while youths are publicly traded. To safeguard children and decrease the number of victims sold for sexual violence, it is critical to investigate sex trafficking laws and the individual people who run the businesses.
Sex slavery is defined as the enrollment, holding, or receipt of individuals through the danger of using force or other methods of coercion, kidnappings, fraud, misuse of power, or frailty, or the offering or getting of payments or advantages in order to gain the permission of a person having control over another individual with the intention of exploitation. Human sex manipulation shall include, at a minimum, the manipulation of others’ sexual exploitation or other forms of sexual abuse.
According to global reports, sex trafficking is an underreported crime with multiple faces (Global report on trafficking in persons _2020, 2021). Sex trafficking is the third largest and fastest-increasing global criminal activity (Shamsudeen, 2022). Teenagers under the age of 18 cannot lawfully consent to commercial sex selling and are subjects of sexual maltreatment, according to existing federal policy on human trafficking (DiRienzo, 2020).
While exact figures are impossible to determine, data suggest that 100,000 to 300,000 teenagers are kidnapped and sold in the United States each year (DiRienzo, 2020). More than 80% of the cases investigated by the Department of Justice identified the casualties as U.S. residents, not immigrants (Valandra, 2018). Sexual enslavement casualties appear as common individuals and fit in with the broader public, making it difficult to identify those in need.
Traffickers employ deception and operation to lure their victims, typically assuring them luxurious lives full of money and empty assurances of anything the victim could desire. Frequently, traffickers target the community’s most susceptible members, like fugitives, those in the foster care system, troubled youths, or those suffering from substance addiction or trauma. The most commonly researched risk factor for domestic minor sex trafficking (DMST) is childhood sexual assault and the trauma caused by such abuse.
Once a victim has been successfully persuaded, it is too late; the victim is now imprisoned in poverty, compelled to work in terrible conditions with no pay and no place to turn. Because they are often viewed as prostitutes rather than victims, many people find it difficult to receive aid, leading them to live a life of enslavement. Victims are compelled to work in various occupations, including boulevard prostitution, illegitimate body massage parlors, escort services, brothels and online promotion centers. Just as there is no single sort of victim, there is no single type of trafficker: they might be overseas nationals, U.S. citizens, strangers, family members, friends, or even victims’ partners.
Gang members, pimps, business owners, diplomats, labor brokers, farms, and factory owners can all be traffickers. Sometimes traffickers operate alone, while in other instances, they are part of a larger organization and operate as a group. Some traffickers appear disguised as popular personalities, such as artist Jeffrey Epstein and R. Kelly, who was even associates with former President Trump (Johnson, 2020).
Victims, are seen as goods to be purchased and traded repeatedly. Inconsistent regulations between states, unknowledgeable law enforcement officers, and victim misapprehension all add to the negative stigma associated with individuals who have been survivors of sex trafficking. Fear of their trafficker’s language issues and fear of law implementation frequently prevent victims from looking for aid, making human sex trafficking a clandestine crime. Persons can be challenging to deal with, juries can be cruel, and police, investigators, and adjudicators all have their personal agendas.
Policies Affecting Sex Trafficking
Congress approved the Mann Act Congress passed the Mann Act in 1910 (Allerfeldt, 2019). By this definition, the Mann Act is a federal statute that explicitly prohibits transporting any woman or girl for prostitution, debauchery, or any other unethical purpose. During the Bush government, the Sexual exploitation and Abuse Protection Act of 2000 provided tackles to fight human enslavement both domestically and internationally. The TVPA (Trafficking Victims Protection Act) made human enslavement a federal offense and labeled juveniles who engage in commercial sex acts as trafficking people rather than offenders.
Washington also turns out to be the first state to ban sex trading in 2003, with other states quickly following suit (Goelzhauser & Rose, 2017). In some places, the definition is primarily focused on using physical force. Other stages include mental control, legal harassment, financial threats, and drug dependence in a broader sense. However, because there is no precise definition of human trafficking, convicting the traffickers can be difficult. Traffickers assert they do not pressure or coerce people to participate, yet many victims are afraid to speak up because of intimidations from the trafficker.
Many people suffer from Stockholm syndrome and are terrified of the consequences of seeking treatment or confessing. The general public frequently believes that prostitutes cannot be sexually assaulted by definition. A girl is thought to have sold her basic rights by selling her own body. This is a horrifying way to see sex trafficking victims because it breaches the most crucial kind of regard for one’s body and decisions. Prior to 2018, the adjudicator had to show the perpetrator’s awareness of the child’s age at the time the kid was sold into slavery – which can be extremely difficult to accomplish (Muraszkiewicz, 2018). It is equally vital in the fight against human sex trafficking to aid victims in acquiring the help and support they need to be reintegrated back into the community.
Many people experienced mental health issues like PTSD, anxiety, and depression. Others, on the other hand, have physical health problems such as STDs, deprived health, drug abuse, and antenatal issues. Many people believe that providing victim services is more significant than condemning traffickers. As a result, the Department of Justice allocated $45 million to organizations that assist victims of sex trafficking in 2017. (Farrell et al., 2019).
Finding a secure home to live, getting work training to get their lives back on trail, and receiving assistance from qualified pain therapists to help involved individuals come to grips with their life experience and move forward are all covered by program funding. Breaking Free is among of the most forward-thinking victim service organizations in the country. Breaking Free has been functional since 1996 with the main aim: to provide shelter and assist children and youths in escaping sex trafficking.
Victims’ Awareness
Sex trafficking, dubbed “America’s Dirty Secret,” generates an astounding $9.5 billion yearly, obscured by huge actions such as the Super Bowl (Martin & Hill, 2019). According to the Florida directive trafficking of human beings, juveniles were brought to the Miami area and sexually exploited to meet the increased demand during the 2009 Super Bowl (Martin & Hill, 2019). Sex trafficking is a public-health and social issue, with victims experiencing same mental health issues such as PTSD, suicidality, depression, and anxiety. Slaves of sexual and physical violence have been linked to these and other mental health disorders.
The Justice Department is committed to fighting human sex trafficking by reinforcing national and native laws and working with investigators and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The FBI’s Operation Cross Country, which concentrates on recouping juvenile prostitution victims and increasing public awareness of the sex trafficking problem, saved 84 sexually exploited children and arrested 120 traffickers (DiRienzo, 2020).
Among those disqualified was the mother of a 3-month-old kid and her 5-year-old sister, who decided to sell them for $600 and sex to an undercover police officer (DiRienzo, 2020). In 2011, ACTeams (Anti-Trafficking Coordination Teams) were formed officially. ACTeams bring together federal agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (DiRienzo, 2020). Others comprise the FBI, the unit of labor’s wage and hour division, and the Unit of Labor’s Agency of the Inspector General, as well as federal prosecutors from U.S. Attorneys’ Offices.
The Department of Justice’s highly trained Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit is also included in the operations to improve high-impact federal prosecutions and investigations (Wilkins, 2019). During its first year of operation, teams made significant progress in combating sex trafficking, with complaints brought increasing by a large percentage country wide, complainants charged increasing considerably country wide, and defendants found guilty increasing dramatically country wide.
Stigma Associated with Victims
Most of the bad stigma associated with victims of sex trafficking stems from a lack of laws protecting victims. This conundrum arises because our current legal system for dealing with sex work cases does not frequently regard trafficking as a basic form of prostitution. Because there is still significant disagreement about whether sex work is intrinsically exploitative and thus a type of enslavement, circumstances of prostitution are regulated by each state’s version of prostitution legislation rather than federal trafficking legislation. This suggests that victims have little to no security as a result of a legislative issue.
To claim that somebody is willingly engaging in trafficking when they are manifestly forced is a he-said-she-said mindset. It is difficult for the general people to comprehend that such heinous atrocities occur in our backyards when they do. When a young person is considered a criminal as a prostitute when coerced into trafficking, it impedes their development and general health. Instead of marginalizing the youth, the emphasis should be on acclimatizing them and assisting them in receiving the aid, they so sorely require having a life full of possibility – particularly if their life has been cruelly deprived of normalcy.
Impacts
When evaluating the economic impacts of sex trafficking, the difficulties in assessing its consequences become clear. In any case, the main economic consequences of trafficking are described. The value of all resources devoted to its prevention, victim support and care and lawbreaker capture and punishment are just a few of the various factors that go into determining the costs of human trafficking. Confiscating illegal proceeds and the assets of traffickers may help counteract some of these costs. Human resources are also lost, and tax revenue is reduced as a result of human trafficking.
Furthermore, human trafficking transfers the financial gains from immigration from migrants, their families, the community, and the government to the traffickers and their collaborators. All signs point to a significant and worldwide cash stream from connected organized crime. Given the continuing nature of the exploitation, human trafficking offers criminal organizations with a reliable and consistent source of cash, which affects both other criminal activities and legal business.
Solutions Proposed
There have been numerous attempts at combating sex trafficking in United States. Many states have passed Safe Harbor legislation which was among the primary laws to safeguard minors from sexual mistreatment. The main goal being diverting child victims of commercial sex and child sex trafficking away from the system of criminal justice and into the child welfare system (Weitzer, 2019). These restrictions, in particular, have the potential to significantly improve the condition of the most vulnerable children. Safe Harbor laws are the primary move toward viewing teenagers as casualties rather than offenders, which is essential in acclimatizing rather than harming the livelihoods of children. Prosecutors are one of the most powerful tools in the fight against human sexual exploitation and trafficking.
Meanwhile, many people believe that preventing victims from buying sex is the most efficient method of fighting sex trafficking. The most appropriate way to end the abuse is to target the sex buyers: when they leave, the cycle of deterioration breaks. By focusing on the customers, victims are less likely to be misrepresented as prostitutes. In the year 2000, President Bill Clinton signed the first human trafficking legislation, making sex and labor trafficking a federal offense (Weitzer, 2019).
The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 was a positive step toward combating sex trafficking (Lobasz, 2018). The bill’s introduction opened the way for cooperation with other nations and the establishment of international norms to combat sex enslavement. However, this did not put a stop sex enslavement in the nation. There are still millions of sex trafficking victims globally, with the United States leading in demand (Lobasz, 2018). Despite several reauthorizations and changes, the numbers of sex traffickers continue to rise; sex trafficking is a fervently contested crime.
One of the most key initiatives, in in addition to safeguarding children and disconnecting buyers, is trying to enlighten law enforcement officials about sex trafficking. More people will be saved if law implementation generals are more conscious of the situation and can recognize victims more easily. Better regulations, less complicated legislation and a national guideline would all assist in putting an end to sex trafficking. These laws include Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking Criminalization, Criminal Provisions Addressing Demand, Criminal Provisions for Traffickers, Criminal Provisions for Facilitators, Protective Provisions for Child Victims, Criminal Justice Tools for Investigation and Prosecution.
The rights of trafficked individuals under current international law are increasingly more clearly defined, particularly their rights to protection and support, in order for people who have been identified as being trafficked to be transferred to a secure location where they can obtain a range of services, including medical and psychological attention, shelter, legal assistance, and protection, a variety of intergovernmental organizations and non-governmental administrations have released a range of good practice guidelines. Values for the special care of children have also been developed with much work.
Conclusion
Despite its secrecy, human sexual exploitation is the biggest unlawful organization in the United States. Sex trafficking, a form of modern-day slavery, kills thousands of people of all colors, races, religions, and nationalities. The first critical steps in combating human enslavement are to boost education among first emergency personnel, focus on victims’ rehabilitation, and eliminate purchasers. It is a horrible crime in society’s ills, swindling the lives of the susceptible class for the advantage of traffickers.
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