Friday, April 30, 2010
Rescuing girls from sex slavery
By Ebonne Ruffins, CNN
April 30, 2010 7:00 a.m. EDT
Kathmandu, Nepal (CNN) -- Geeta was 9 when she began wearing makeup, staying up until 2 a.m. and having sex with as many as 60 men a day.
"I used to be really sad and frustrated with what was happening in my life," she said.
The daughter of Nepalese peasant farmers, Geeta -- now 26 -- had been sold to a brothel in India by a member of her extended family. The family member had duped Geeta's visually impaired mother into believing her daughter would get work at a clothing company in Nepal.
"The brothel where I was ... there [were] many customers coming in every day. The owner used to verbally abuse us, and if we didn't comply, [she] would start beating us with wires, rods and hot spoons."
It was not until Geeta was 14 that a police officer rescued her and brought her to a safe house compound run by Anuradha Koirala. The 61-year-old woman and her group, Maiti Nepal, have been fighting for more than 16 years to rescue and rehabilitate thousands of Nepal's sex trafficking victims.
"Families are tricked all the time," said Koirala. "The trafficking of the girls is done by people who are basically known to the girls, who can lure them from the village by telling them they are getting a nice job. It's a lucrative business."
By raiding brothels, patrolling the India-Nepal border and providing safe shelter and support services, Koirala and Maiti Nepal have helped rescue and rehabilitate more than 12,000 Nepali women and girls since 1993.
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According to the U.S. State Department, some 10,000 to 15,000 women and girls from Nepal are trafficked to India and then sexually exploited each year.
Koirala's own history in an abusive relationship led her to her crusade. For most of her young adulthood, she taught primary school English in Nepal. But when her relationship took a violent turn, her life's "purpose and responsibility completely changed," she said.
"Every day, there was battering. And then I had three miscarriages that I think [were] from the beating. It was very difficult because I didn't know in those days where to go and report [it], who to ... talk to."
After the relationship ended, Koirala used a portion of her $100 monthly salary to start a small retail shop to employ and support displaced victims of sex trafficking and domestic violence.
By the early 1990s, an increasing demand for help and persistent cases of violence against women compelled Koirala to do more. Maiti Nepal was her brainchild for giving voice, legal defense and rehabilitation to victims of sex trafficking.
Roughly translated, Maiti means "Mother's Home." The group has facilities throughout Nepal and India, but most of the rehabilitation work takes place at its main campus in Kathmandu, Nepal.
Koirala said girls from the brothels arrive empty-handed, sick, in many cases pregnant or with small children, and "psychologically broken."
"When the girl first comes to Maiti Nepal, we never, never ask them a question. We just let them [be] for as long as they need. We let them play, dance, walk, talk to a friend," Koirala said. "They are afraid at first, but eventually they will talk to us on their own."
The group also takes in rape and domestic violence survivors, as well as abandoned children.
"I cannot say no to anybody," Koirala said. "Everybody comes to Maiti Nepal."
Accommodating its population of close to 400 women and children requires a large staff of teachers, counselors and medical personnel -- and dozens of bunk beds. Many of the staff are sex trafficking survivors now committed to helping rehabilitate other girls. The work is funded by grants and donations from around the world.
Post-rescue recovery is comprehensive. Maiti Nepal provides medical treatment, psychological and legal counseling, formal court filings and criminal prosecution, all for free.
While some of the girls are able to return to their families, many of them -- particularly those with HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases -- become socially stigmatized and are no longer welcome in their home communities. For these girls, Maiti Nepal becomes their new, and possibly last, home. A hospice on the compound's grounds houses terminally ill patients.
"The hardest part for me is to see a girl dying or coming back with different diseases at an [age] when she should be out frolicking," Koirala said. "That's what fuels me to work harder."
The group's ultimate goal is to help girls become economically independent and reintegrated into society.
"We try to give them whatever work they want to do, whatever training they want to do, because when you're economically empowered, people forget everything. People even forget [she is] HIV-positive or was trafficked," Koirala said.
Koirala and at least 50 trafficking survivors also participate in what she calls social preventive work outside the campus. Their community awareness camps educate families in rural villages and city slums about the dangers of sex trafficking, and a daily patrol at crossing points along the India-Nepal border successfully rescues an average of four Nepali girls a day.
"Our girls are border guards who have been trafficked themselves. They easily recognize a girl that is being trafficked or will be trafficked," Koirala said. "The girls need no motivation from me. They know the horrors of the brothel, and they are here to save their sisters."
Some girls who are trafficked choose to remain prostitutes for life because their home villages will not accept them. But Koirala says that among those rescued by Maiti Nepal, there isn't a single case when a girl has returned back to the streets.
Geeta's recovery is one of the group's success stories. Today, she works at Maiti Nepal as a peer educator and also helps with the group's awareness camps. She credits Koirala and Maiti Nepal for the strength to keep living and the confidence to join the fight against sex trafficking.
"Anuradha is a hero. ... She's courageous," Geeta said. "She gave me my faith back. ... If Maiti Nepal wasn't there for me, I would be dead by now."
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/04/29/cnnheroes.koirala.nepal/index.html?hpt=C1
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
A year in review: The Brittanee Drexel Case (part 2 of 2)
By Graeme Moore
Tuesday, April 27, 2010 at 5:58 p.m.
One year ago, scores of police officers and volunteer searchers traipsed through rural parts of Georgetown and Charleston Counties looking for a teen who had vanished in Myrtle Beach.
It was unusually warm, and the bugs were aggressive. Wild boars and alligators lurked just out of sight. The dangers to searchers and their dogs were real. It was no place for a 17-year-old girl to be.
But there were reasons to believe Brittanee Drexel, the spring breaker from Rochester, NY, may have been there, and detectives were running against the clock as they tried to find her.
Just before 9:00 p.m. on April 25, 2009, surveillance video caught Drexel leaving the Blue Water Resort on Ocean Boulevard. She was heading back to where she was staying, the Bar Harbour Motel, but she never made it.
By Monday, the search for her concentrated in that rural area around the Santee Rivers because detectives tracked her cell signals there.
They had determined Brittanee, who was a fervent cell phone user, sent her last text message at 8:58 p.m. on Saturday while still in Myrtle Beach. She never made another call or text, and by 10:18 p.m., her cell phone was pinging on a tower along the Georgetown/Charleston County line.
Not only did that alarm detectives, but it sent her mother into a panicked frenzy.
"I was frantic because you never think this is going to happen to your child. Ever," said Dawn Drexel during an interview on the anniversary of her daughter's one-year disappearance.
Brittanee had gone to Myrtle Beach, against her mother's will, with a group of friends, and she had met up with other Rochester kids while on spring break.
In fact, she was with a group of guys at the Blue Water Resort just before she vanished. In the beginning, police homed in on one of those men, Peter Brozowitz, a nightclub promoter from Rochester.
In the court of public opinion, Brozowitz was eyed suspiciously when he hired a lawyer and when it was found out he drove back to Rochester just hours after Brittanee vanished.
However, as the weeks dragged on, detectives ruled out Brozowitz and dropped the "person of interest" label he had been assigned from the beginning.
Meanwhile, the searches continued for Brittanee or any evidence of her along the Santee Rivers and even back in Myrtle Beach, but after weeks and months of intense searching, nothing turned up.
By early Fall, detectives had classified the case as becoming cold, and Drexel began to fade from the headlines. then something changed in late December when some sunglasses were found along a riverbank.
They resembled a pair of glasses Brittanee was wearing the day before she vanished. After being sent off for forensic testing, detectives said they were unable to determine if, in fact, they belong to Brittanee.
New People and Location of Interest
In January 2010, after no major breaks in the case, there was a task force formed, made up of detectives from Myrtle Beach, and Georgetown Charleston Counties.
They have worked out of Georgetown County Investigator Chris Bailey's office since the beginning of the year, and they say the case is heating up.
Bailey credits an early December tip as the one that turned the case around and generated new leads. He wouldn't elaborate on the tip, but says it's been enough to obtain search warrants which have led to several people of interest.
"They're suspected of being present with Brittanee (and) knowing her whereabouts or possible whereabouts," Bailey said of the people of interest during an interview a few weeks ago.
No names were released nor was information on what was searched, but Bailey and the other investigators said they feel confident they're looking at the right people.
"All of our little pieces of evidence ... they're all pointing in the same direction towards certain people," said Myrtle Beach Investigator Vincent Dorio.
Detectives said they feel they're handling a homicide investigation and fear Brittanee is dead, but her mother, Dawn, holds out hope and refuses to accept her daughter is dead.
"I just hope, when I'm at home or sitting down or just doing something, that Brittanee is going to walk through that door."
If you've got information on the case, you're asked to call the Georgetown County Sheriff's Office at 843-436-6058 843-436-6058 or Myrtle Beach Police at 843-918-1382 843-918-1382. You can remain anonymous.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.carolinalive.com/news/story.aspx?id=449393
Mother of missing teen reflects after one year (Part 1 of 2)
By Graeme Moore
Monday, April 26, 2010 at 6:00 p.m.
Read more: Local, Dawn Drexel, Brittanee Drexel, Missing Spring Breaker, Myrtle Beach
The mother of missing teen Brittanee Drexel calls the past year a living nightmare that won't end.
"It's the most horrible thing you ever want to go through," Dawn Drexel said during a recent interview.
On April 25, 2009, Dawn's first-born child, Brittanee, vanished from Ocean Boulevard while on spring break.
The then-17-year-old was last seen leaving the Blue Water Resort near 20th Avenue South and Ocean Boulevard, and no one has seen her since.
This time last year, Brittanee, from Rochester, NY, was juggling a lot with her mom and dad's divorce, boyfriend troubles and even a bout of depression.
So it was no surprise Brittanee wanted a break and begged her mother for permission to visit Myrtle Beach for her high school spring break.
When Dawn Drexel told her daughter no, Brittanee became angry and the two began to fight. Exhausted, Dawn allowed Brittanee to go stay a couple of nights with a friend in Rochester.
But that was a lie as Dawn found out later, and Brittanee disobeyed her mother and went to Myrtle Beach anyway.
Many have come down hard on Dawn and accused her of being a bad parent -- an accusation Dawn vehemently dismisses.
"You know what? Brit's a teenager," Dawn explained. "We were all teens once. They (Dawn's critics) have done things their parents wouldn't approve of. ... Don't throw a rock at a glass house."
Dawn speaks lovingly of Brittanee and describes her first-born as a "lovable little girl" who loved everyone.
Home videos of Brittanee show a seven-year-old girl on Christmas morning overwhelmed with excitement as she opened a new "Lion King" toy and impersonated one of the characters.
"She would sit there and put a show on for us. She'd sing and dance. She loved to have an audience," Dawn said.
But as most teens do, Brittanee got older and traded in the toys for cell phones and boyfriends.
"As she started getting older, she wanted to be more with her friends," Dawn said. "They didn't want to hang out with their mom and dad. God forbid you kiss them in front of anybody," Dawn said with a laugh.
One of those friends is Tarah Friedman, who's a few years older than Brittanee, but said they two were like sisters.
"When I think of her, I just think of her smile, her laugh. She was always laughing, such a happy person," Friedman said as she described Brittanee.
Besides friends and high school life, Brittanee had bigger plans. She loved cosmetology, soccer and modeling. Just before she vanished, though, she had a change of heart while at a hospital one evening.
"She says 'mom, I think I'm going to go to school to be a nurse ... she wanted to be in the maternity ward and take care of the babies," Dawn recalled.
And Brittanee wanted children of her own one day, and Dawn said she talked about "Mr. Right" often.
"She was always talked about how she was going to make her husband cook and how many kids she was going to have."
But all of those big plans came to a halt last year with Brittanee's disappearance, and the news has rocked Brittanee's friends and family.
"It's like something is missing from you. And then you see it on TV, and it's just a reminder that she's really, really gone, and nobody can find her," Friedman, the best friend, explained.
No one knows that better than Dawn who holds on to hope that her daughter will come home alive, but who also knows that may not be reality.
"For her to go through something like that just kills. I mean as a parent, you'd rather have it done to yourself than your child," Dawn said. "Nobody, I mean nobody wishes that on anybody."
Recently, this reporter broke the news that police have developed people of interest and a location of interest in Brittanee's case, and the detectives have said they are close to offering closure.
"It's just a matter of time now before everything gets put together, and we can say yes, here's a solid arrest," said Myrtle Beach Detective Vincent Dorio.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.carolinalive.com/news/story.aspx?list=195106&id=448770
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Bill to shield child prostitutes touted in Senate
By Abbe Smith
NEW HAVEN — When a young girl finds herself out on the street, selling her body to pay her pimp or because she has a drug addiction, it’s not prostitution — it’s coercion, abuse, slavery.
That’s the premise behind a new bill making its way through the state Senate that would protect children from being prosecuted for the crime of prostitution. The proposed “Safe Harbor” bill creates the presumption that children and teens who engage in prostitution are victims of sexual exploitation.
“They are coerced or forced into this trade, and they should be treated as victims instead of criminals,” said state Sen. Rob Kane, R-Watertown, who sponsored Senate Bill 153.
“The big thing is, this needs to be brought up and it needs to be talked about. It can’t be swept under the rug.”
Specifically, the bill says anyone under the age of 16 cannot be prosecuted for crimes of prostitution. For 16- and 17-year-olds facing prostitution charges, “there shall be a presumption that the actor was coerced into committing such offense by another person.”
Kane said he hopes to have a vote on the bill before the Senate’s current session ends May 5.
The bill has faced some opposition. In testimony to the Select Committee on Children in Hartford, Chief State’s Attorney Kevin Kane spoke against the bill, which he argued “seeks to address a problem that does not exist in the state of Connecticut.” He went on to state that “the Division of Justice is not in the business of prosecuting the innocent victims of human trafficking” and notes that under existing state law, children under 16 cannot be prosecuted for prostitution because they cannot legally consent to sex at that age.
Advocates of the proposed Safe Harbor bill agree the state has not had many cases of minors arrested for prostitution. However, they say the legislation will do more than just protect minors from being prosecuted for crimes of which they are victim, it will also raise awareness about the problem of child sex trafficking and exploitation.
“The goal is to intervene in (the victims’) lives and make available services to let them know they have another choice, to let them know they do have rights, that the law works in their favor,” said Kathy Maskell, U.S. advocacy director for New Haven-based Love 146, an organization that fights child sex slavery and exploitation at home and around the globe.
EVEN IN CONNECTICUT
Children get recruited into the sex trade at alarmingly young ages. The average age that a girl enters the world of prostitution is 13 years old. Child victims face lower life expectancies stemming from the devastating consequences of sex trafficking: depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, physical abuse, risk of suicide, sexually transmitted disease. They have a greater chance of being murdered during their lifetimes.
At Love 146’s safe house in the Philippines for female victims of sex trafficking, survivors expressed deeply troubling self-images as a result of their harrowing ordeals.
“I feel like a dog. I feel like dirt. I could never return home, I feel worthless. These are the words they use to describe themselves,” Maskell says. “I don’t think it would be a stretch to say U.S.-born victims would feel the same way.”
Supporters of the bill say the problem of child sex trafficking is not relegated to foreign countries; they say sexual exploitation of children happens right here in the United States, even here in Connecticut. Since 2008, the state Department of Children and Families has identified 25 youths in Connecticut as victims of child sex trafficking, according to testimony in support of the bill by Connecticut Voices for Children.
Also in 2008, two men were sentenced in federal court for their roles in prostitution rings that had victims in Connecticut and New York. Dennis Paris was sentenced to 30 years in prison for prostituting minors as young as 14 years old in the Hartford area. Authorities said Paris recruited young girls from troubled backgrounds, some of whom were addicted to drugs. Corey Davis was convicted of trafficking more than 20 females, including a 12-year-old girl, and forcing them to work as prostitutes and strippers.
Experts say those most at-risk for being coerced into prostitution are child runaways and victims of sexual or physical abuse. But the reality is that sexual exploitation of children through prostitution can happen anywhere, at any time, according to Maskell.
“Because of the Internet, it really does open it up to anyone in any socio-economic community,” she says.
A number of local nonprofit organizations, state agencies and youth advocates have banded together in support of S.B. 153, including the state Office of Victim Advocate, the Connecticut Commission on Children, Love 146, Connecticut Voices for Children, ECPAT-USA, the Essex-based Paul and Lisa Program, and the Clinton-based Barnaba Institute.
Alexis Taylor Litos, executive director of the Barnaba Institute, says even though not many minors get arrested for prostitution in the state, children who are exploited through sex trafficking often get picked up for other offences. Instead of getting intervention and the help they need to get out danger, these kids get lost in the legal system, she says. Being treated like a criminal sends victims spiraling deeper into despair.
“It is instilling that self-blame and making them feel it is their fault,” Litos says.
In some cases, she adds, the teens give false identification to police to appear older. Litos says better training in the area of sex-trafficking and sexual exploitation of children would enable first responders to do a better job of identifying red flags and clues that a child or young teen is being abused or trafficked.
Of all the people who went before the state Select Committee on Children or sent letters to express support for the “Safe Harbor” bill, the most profound voice belongs to an 18-year-old Connecticut woman, who herself was a victim of sexual exploitation. In a letter to the committee, the woman wrote that she was a scared kid who ran away from home and ended up trapped in a life of prostitution by the age of 14.
“I didn’t know what I was getting myself into to. I have been raped and beaten many times and I still have these memories that will be with me for the rest of my life. I was 14 years old. I did not try to tell anyone because I was scared,” the unidentified woman wrote.
The woman said she got help and was able to escape the world of prostitution, but it was hard.
“I just wish that everyone that goes through this can get the support that they need rather than a jail sentence,” she wrote.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.nhregister.com/articles/2010/04/25/news/new_haven/doc4bd3b5e07a5fa364395395.txt
S.C. not immune to human trafficking (PART 1)
Published: April 24, 2010
Editor’s note: This is the first in a two-part series on human trafficking. Monday’s report will detail trafficking laws, enforcement efforts and efforts by nonprofits to help victims.
FLORENCE — Human trafficking isn’t just a problem for a small government of a third-world country in eastern Europe, Asia or central America.
Human trafficking is here, and it’s happening right now.
Human trafficking — the exploitation of people for commercial sex or forced labor — is referred to as a hidden crime because the victims are often silent and afraid to speak about the acts they are being forced to perform.
Victim advocates, along with law enforcement officers, stand together on the front line of the battle against the crime, said Michael Hildebrand, a Greenville County sheriff’s sergeant who investigates human trafficking crimes.
They are the ones most likely to come in contact with trafficking victims, but to be of assistance, they must first be aware modern-day slavery exists in South Carolina.
A problem not so far away
“Do you know where the first case of human trafficking in the U.S. was reported?” Hildebrand asks a small group of victim advocates and educators Friday during a human trafficking seminar hosted by Pee Dee Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Assault.
“The first case of human trafficking was in South Carolina,” he said. “In Johns Island.”
Women were lured to the small coastal community by traffickers who promised them work in a Florida restaurant. Instead, they were forced into prostitution, Hildebrand said. Each woman was forced to have sex with at least 30 men a day.
The human trafficking ring, which investigators say was operated by the Cardenas crime family, stretched down the Atlantic Coast from South Carolina to Florida and included forced laborers.
Hildebrand said he worked on Greenville County’s first reported human trafficking case in 2000. It involved a foreign-born 13-year-old girl who was hired to be a housekeeper and a babysitter.
Her plight was finally discovered after a neighbor saw the girl pushing a stroller down the street and thought she should be in school at that hour.
The call came into deputies as a truancy case, but authorities discovered she was being forced to work and was denied her basic human rights, Hildebrand said.
There haven’t been any reports of human trafficking in the Pee Dee, said Michelle Harkey, the Pee Dee Coalition’s Florence County domestic and sexual assault services coordinator.
“It’s something that the news and the media are starting to focus on more. Because we haven’t seen it and just because it hasn’t been brought to light yet, that doesn’t mean it isn’t happening,” she said.
In addition to being deputy, Hildebrand works with the Carolinas Institute for Community and Policing, which gathers information on such cases and shares information from the agency with advocates like Harkey.
“Everybody hears of the cases in Tijuana or in Taiwan, but no one wants to hear about this happening in their town,” he said. “But wherever there’s an opportunity for greed or to make money, there’s a chance for human trafficking.”
Lucrative business
Human trafficking is believed to net $9 billion in profits each year, Hildebrand said. Next to drug trafficking, human trafficking is the most lucrative business for organized crime.
The global business of human trafficking is closely related to economic conditions, he said.
Authorities say the Russian mafia was the first to begin trafficking humans in the U.S. because of the dire economic circumstances and political unrest in the country in the 1980s and early 1990s. Organized criminals told Russian prostitutes they could come to American cities and do the same “jobs” they had been doing and make more money, Hildebrand said.
The offers seemed attractive. But when they arrived in the U.S., they weren’t allowed to leave or make their own decisions.
Traffickers sometimes operate brothels or so-called massage parlors where women and young girls are forced to participate in sex acts with dozens of men every night, six days a week, Hildebrand said.
“If you charge $20 a john and they must have sex with 30 men per night … this is why it’s becoming the preferred crime,” he said. “They will take these girls to the doctors to have abortions or to be treated for sexually-transmitted diseases because these things hurt their business.”
The American dream
Traffickers sometimes recruit their victims from their home cities and villages in countries across Central America, eastern Europe and Asia by luring them with stories of a better life in America where they will have freedom, money and better resources, Hildebrand said.
“(U.S. citizens) like to think that we have the best situation in the world,” he said. “They will use the American dream to bring victims here. As a human trafficker, it’s very easy to show them a picture of his nice house and his car to get them to come here.”
Traffickers who return home after living in America are seen as respectable people with status and are trusted, Hildebrand said.
“The parents of victims, they think they are doing the right thing,” he said. “(Traffickers) lure the parents into allowing their children to come with them to have a job and a better life. The parents may live in mud huts and they want more for their children.”
Once they arrive in the United States, the traffickers seize the passports of their victims and force them to work in farming or in the sex trade.
To avoid detection by U.S. authorities, traffickers sometimes operate in what is known as a closed network, Hildebrand said.
“Everybody — the men, the traffickers, the victims — are of the same (ethnic) origin,” he said.
Close network cases are more difficult to investigate because of the language barrier for the victims and their unfamiliarity with the U.S. government and its policies on trafficking. Traffickers paralyze their victims with fear, telling them if they don’t cooperate they will be deported or their families back home will be murdered, Hildebrand said. Because of that fear, human trafficking victims remain invisible.
Some come from countries with corrupt governments, Hildebrand said, so they have learned to fear police and government officials.
Female victims also may come from different cultures where their rights are limited, he said.
“If she was able to escape, where is she going to go?” Hildebrand asked.
Respectfully submitted from:
http://www2.scnow.com/scp/news/local/pee_dee/article/s.c._not_immune_to_human_trafficking/132062/
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Why we're offering €1m for our Amy
Saturday April 24 2010
By John Meagher
The sisters of Bernadette Connolly still seek the truth about her murder 40 years on, and this week another family devastated by the loss of a loved one are in the news after offering a €1m award for information about her.
Dubliner Amy Fitzpatrick was just 15 when she disappeared near Malaga, Spain, on New Year's Day 2008. Her devastated mother, Audrey, and stepfather, Dave Mahon, have made the money available to anyone who provides information that leads to her discovery, dead or alive.
"The money has been put up by four friends of mine," Mahon says. "They put in €250,000 each, but want to remain anonymous. The cash is being offered for one month and we feel that it will be a big enough incentive for anyone who knows important information to contact us.
"So far, we've had 60 phone calls, but the vast majority of them are scams and hoaxes. But three calls are being taken seriously by the police.
"This reward is for us to get Amy back one way or another. We have been thinking about doing this for a long time but obviously didn't have the funds for doing this ourselves so we are lucky to have these people who have offered their money to help us."
Amy vanished as she walked home form a friend's house near Malaga. "It's the not knowing what happened to her that is so devastating," Mahon, an estate agent, says. "We desperately hope she's alive and hopefully this money will provide us with answers."
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/why-were-offering-83641m-for-our-amy-2150926.html
Thursday, April 22, 2010
New Non-Fiction Book Exposes Priests and Nuns for Raping and Abusing Children
Merkel, Obama, Pelosi, Mussolini, Winfrey asked to help remove state, federal, civil and criminal statutes of limitation for sexual assault of kids, tweens & teens
San Francisco, CA (MMD Newswire) April 21, 2010 -- According to a new book, only a few U.S. priests and nuns rape children under 12, serially rape children under 11, gang rape children under 10, sodomize kids under 9, give kids AIDS, get 11 year olds pregnant, abort children and teenagers, ritually abuse kids, sexually assault kids, torture kids, murder kids, and abandon their illegitimate children borne of kids they raped. A few nuns and priests rape, prostitute, torture, sexually assault and proffer kids ... all at the same 1.5% percentile as perps & pervs in society: of one million Catholic priests worldwide, only 15,000 sexually assault kids and teens. Of ten million nuns, only 150,000 are perps & pervs. (Statistics count only Catholic priests & nuns, not other religions, boy scouts, etc.)
A shocking expose and practical resource book, i missed me after the terror, during the years of unbearable sorrow: trafficking the holy Spirit, by Alan Allen (Trafford-available May 15) includes testimony, church canon, documentation, healing resources, and a directory of clergy perps by state, country and diocese. Adult survivors of childhood trauma share non-graphic, personal stories stripping euphemisms of ‘child abuse' and ‘inappropriate touching' to unmask the terror perpetrated against them by sadists, psychopaths, sociopaths and the criminally insane hidden behind the clichés and collars and habits.
Available May 15, 2010 from Ingram; Baker & Taylor, Amazon www.amazon.com, Barnes & Noble www.bn.com, and Trafford www.trafford.com. For pre-order information, email: imissedme@gmail.com.
Editor Alan Allan says, "We all need to show world legislators, the public and Angela Merkel, Michele Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Alessandra Mussolini and Oprah Winfrey why we should change state, federal, civil and criminal statutes of limitation for child sexual assault to the lifetime of the child in the U.S., E.U. and Americas so children are safe and we can once again set a new moral standard for the U.S. and the world." The book tells the whole story in the U.S., Europe and Mexico, and lists resources for victims seeking help.
An appendix describes in many States, statutes of limitation on rape were adopted in part based on the Kinsey Report ... which since has been shown that the ‘normal sexual data' of orgasms in infants, children, tweens and teens used in the report was supplied by Nazi Gestapo child rapists who ‘used a stopwatch' to count how many orgasms children aged 7 months to 12 years old have per minute, per hour and per day - and was the basis for the sexual revolution in the U.S. and U.S. classroom -- and one reason why the statutes of limitation on sexual abuse of children should be removed, extended to the life of the child, or ‘windowed' and be based on democracy not nazi perv standards. The Vatican's Bishops lobby against rollback of statutes, preferring a less-costly containment view where litigation expiration dates prevent moral, civil & criminal redress. This leaves perps on the streets.
Another reason is the psychiatric record says children traumatized by sexual assault cope by forgetting until mid-age, then remember ...long after statutes of limitation have expired. So, a ‘window' must be opened in the statutes, or the statutes dropped for legal remedy. Meanwhile, kids live lost lives that never would have been, as strangers to themselves, had they not endured violent trauma, broken lives and years of unbearable sorrow.
An appendix also reports a new racket of adopting kids for international sex trafficking by ‘parents' in the U.S., Europe and the Americas. Doe v Holy See established you can sue the Vatican because Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (diplomatic immunity) doesn't apply in cases of criminal conspiracy," said Jeff Anderson, attorney, referring to movement of a priest from Ireland to Chicago to Portland to evade prosecution.
Attorney Rebecca Randles says, "We represent people as kids sexually abused by nuns, an area kept quiet." The book includes an expose on kids, tweens and teens sexually assaulted by nuns.
"People react in denial because of spiritual immaturity, stuck in magical thinking, ‘I need the Bishop, the Priest, if I'm going to see God.' Well, that's nonsense," says Tom Doyle, a Catholic priest, formerly Secretary-Canonist at Vatican Embassy, Wash., D.C., interviewed in the book.
"Danger by sex offenders to kids and teens is unrivaled for enduring damage," says Barbara Blaine, Survivor's Network of those Abused by Priests founder. Terry McKiernan, bishopaccountability.org founder is interviewed.
Says Paris Arrow, "We need to get rid of the Pope's pedophile army" of 15,000 predator priests. And 150,000 predator nuns.
According to the author in addressing the Vatican, "C'mon, if you can murder millions of people for thousands of years in the Inquisition, you can't get rid of 165,000 heretic predator priests and nuns of your own? It's because you don't want to. Not because you can't".
Causis & Crimens Sollicitationis are Papal edicts to excommunicate priests for merely talking about them having sexually assaulted children, gays or animals ...but, does not excommunicate them for doing it.
Papal subsecretial Canon 489, requires Diocesan record keeping of sex crimes. But, Vatican diplomatic immunity and "separation of church & state" arguments prevents city attorneys from seizing files.
The author says, "Why does a religion need diplomatic immunity? Why does a religion need national sovereignty bestowed upon it by fascists and nazis financed by City of London privately owned interlocking directorates of central banks? Diplomatic immunity and national sovereignty for the Vatican, Knights of Malta (the Vatican's global military intelligence branch) and City of London (the Vatican's interlocking banking directorate partners) are just for reasons of no good and should be done away with. Moses, Jesus, Christ, Mohammed, Buddha and Krishna did not hide behind diplomatic immunity or foreclose on homes. They promoted the Kindgom of God. The Vatican used diplomatic immunity to avoid testifying in the Vatican Banking scandal when they were caught laundering heroin proceeds.
"For them, the real issue is not diplomatic immunity; or separation of Church and State; or bringing perps & pervs to justice; or helping victims to heal emotionally and spiritually - it's about opening Vatican books and records to county, state and country investigators to determine how much of Vatican wealth is illegal gain and illegal transfer and should be taxed and confiscated, and how much political influence they dictate in the Americas. We need to take a step back and take a hard look at the anti-Kingdom in supporting private ownership of the Vatican bank and it's interlocking directorate of private ownership of the City of London banking syndicate owning the Fed, Bundesbank, Bank of International Settlements, and G-8/G-20 in pressing for private ownership rather than public ownership of central banks." According to the author that is because publicly owned central banks charge no mortgage, home, or loan interest and do not foreclose on homes, cars and eliminate jobs - they are the opposite of privately owned central banks. The real issue here is the anti-kindgom's continuing inquisitional crusade for private capital versus the Kingdom's ideal of redistribution of wealth so all people are healthy, financially free, and safe and secure within the Kingdom ... not just the kings. This is the real meaning of the scriptures of Jesus throwing the bankers out of the Temple, and, after baptism those coming from the river pooling their private wealth and giving it all to those in need." The Lay-Faithful Church is the Kingdom, but the Vatican is the anti-Kingdom. By not removing it's perps & pervs, the Holy See makes its position clear."
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Allen first published at 9 yrs old. Old Rails' Tales, (Trafford) was reviewed by NYT as one of the best books of the year. He recently published in observance of the forthcoming Reagan Centennial, two books: Ronald Reagan & The Evil Empire: a fictional autobiography of Ronald Reagan (abridged edition); and, American Civilian Counter-terrorist Manual: a fictional autobiography of Ronald Reagan (unabridged edition); his books are available from Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Trafford.
i missed me after the terror, during the years of unbearable sorrow
Available May 15, 2010 from Ingram; Baker & Taylor, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Trafford.
For pdf review copies or to schedule interview requests, contact: Alan Kernoff
Tel: 1-925 812-3391 Email: press4imissedme@gmail.com
(Note: only pdf files are available at this time.)
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.mmdnewswire.com/abusing-children-8064.html
San Francisco, CA (MMD Newswire) April 21, 2010 -- According to a new book, only a few U.S. priests and nuns rape children under 12, serially rape children under 11, gang rape children under 10, sodomize kids under 9, give kids AIDS, get 11 year olds pregnant, abort children and teenagers, ritually abuse kids, sexually assault kids, torture kids, murder kids, and abandon their illegitimate children borne of kids they raped. A few nuns and priests rape, prostitute, torture, sexually assault and proffer kids ... all at the same 1.5% percentile as perps & pervs in society: of one million Catholic priests worldwide, only 15,000 sexually assault kids and teens. Of ten million nuns, only 150,000 are perps & pervs. (Statistics count only Catholic priests & nuns, not other religions, boy scouts, etc.)
A shocking expose and practical resource book, i missed me after the terror, during the years of unbearable sorrow: trafficking the holy Spirit, by Alan Allen (Trafford-available May 15) includes testimony, church canon, documentation, healing resources, and a directory of clergy perps by state, country and diocese. Adult survivors of childhood trauma share non-graphic, personal stories stripping euphemisms of ‘child abuse' and ‘inappropriate touching' to unmask the terror perpetrated against them by sadists, psychopaths, sociopaths and the criminally insane hidden behind the clichés and collars and habits.
Available May 15, 2010 from Ingram; Baker & Taylor, Amazon www.amazon.com, Barnes & Noble www.bn.com, and Trafford www.trafford.com. For pre-order information, email: imissedme@gmail.com.
Editor Alan Allan says, "We all need to show world legislators, the public and Angela Merkel, Michele Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Alessandra Mussolini and Oprah Winfrey why we should change state, federal, civil and criminal statutes of limitation for child sexual assault to the lifetime of the child in the U.S., E.U. and Americas so children are safe and we can once again set a new moral standard for the U.S. and the world." The book tells the whole story in the U.S., Europe and Mexico, and lists resources for victims seeking help.
An appendix describes in many States, statutes of limitation on rape were adopted in part based on the Kinsey Report ... which since has been shown that the ‘normal sexual data' of orgasms in infants, children, tweens and teens used in the report was supplied by Nazi Gestapo child rapists who ‘used a stopwatch' to count how many orgasms children aged 7 months to 12 years old have per minute, per hour and per day - and was the basis for the sexual revolution in the U.S. and U.S. classroom -- and one reason why the statutes of limitation on sexual abuse of children should be removed, extended to the life of the child, or ‘windowed' and be based on democracy not nazi perv standards. The Vatican's Bishops lobby against rollback of statutes, preferring a less-costly containment view where litigation expiration dates prevent moral, civil & criminal redress. This leaves perps on the streets.
Another reason is the psychiatric record says children traumatized by sexual assault cope by forgetting until mid-age, then remember ...long after statutes of limitation have expired. So, a ‘window' must be opened in the statutes, or the statutes dropped for legal remedy. Meanwhile, kids live lost lives that never would have been, as strangers to themselves, had they not endured violent trauma, broken lives and years of unbearable sorrow.
An appendix also reports a new racket of adopting kids for international sex trafficking by ‘parents' in the U.S., Europe and the Americas. Doe v Holy See established you can sue the Vatican because Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (diplomatic immunity) doesn't apply in cases of criminal conspiracy," said Jeff Anderson, attorney, referring to movement of a priest from Ireland to Chicago to Portland to evade prosecution.
Attorney Rebecca Randles says, "We represent people as kids sexually abused by nuns, an area kept quiet." The book includes an expose on kids, tweens and teens sexually assaulted by nuns.
"People react in denial because of spiritual immaturity, stuck in magical thinking, ‘I need the Bishop, the Priest, if I'm going to see God.' Well, that's nonsense," says Tom Doyle, a Catholic priest, formerly Secretary-Canonist at Vatican Embassy, Wash., D.C., interviewed in the book.
"Danger by sex offenders to kids and teens is unrivaled for enduring damage," says Barbara Blaine, Survivor's Network of those Abused by Priests founder. Terry McKiernan, bishopaccountability.org founder is interviewed.
Says Paris Arrow, "We need to get rid of the Pope's pedophile army" of 15,000 predator priests. And 150,000 predator nuns.
According to the author in addressing the Vatican, "C'mon, if you can murder millions of people for thousands of years in the Inquisition, you can't get rid of 165,000 heretic predator priests and nuns of your own? It's because you don't want to. Not because you can't".
Causis & Crimens Sollicitationis are Papal edicts to excommunicate priests for merely talking about them having sexually assaulted children, gays or animals ...but, does not excommunicate them for doing it.
Papal subsecretial Canon 489, requires Diocesan record keeping of sex crimes. But, Vatican diplomatic immunity and "separation of church & state" arguments prevents city attorneys from seizing files.
The author says, "Why does a religion need diplomatic immunity? Why does a religion need national sovereignty bestowed upon it by fascists and nazis financed by City of London privately owned interlocking directorates of central banks? Diplomatic immunity and national sovereignty for the Vatican, Knights of Malta (the Vatican's global military intelligence branch) and City of London (the Vatican's interlocking banking directorate partners) are just for reasons of no good and should be done away with. Moses, Jesus, Christ, Mohammed, Buddha and Krishna did not hide behind diplomatic immunity or foreclose on homes. They promoted the Kindgom of God. The Vatican used diplomatic immunity to avoid testifying in the Vatican Banking scandal when they were caught laundering heroin proceeds.
"For them, the real issue is not diplomatic immunity; or separation of Church and State; or bringing perps & pervs to justice; or helping victims to heal emotionally and spiritually - it's about opening Vatican books and records to county, state and country investigators to determine how much of Vatican wealth is illegal gain and illegal transfer and should be taxed and confiscated, and how much political influence they dictate in the Americas. We need to take a step back and take a hard look at the anti-Kingdom in supporting private ownership of the Vatican bank and it's interlocking directorate of private ownership of the City of London banking syndicate owning the Fed, Bundesbank, Bank of International Settlements, and G-8/G-20 in pressing for private ownership rather than public ownership of central banks." According to the author that is because publicly owned central banks charge no mortgage, home, or loan interest and do not foreclose on homes, cars and eliminate jobs - they are the opposite of privately owned central banks. The real issue here is the anti-kindgom's continuing inquisitional crusade for private capital versus the Kingdom's ideal of redistribution of wealth so all people are healthy, financially free, and safe and secure within the Kingdom ... not just the kings. This is the real meaning of the scriptures of Jesus throwing the bankers out of the Temple, and, after baptism those coming from the river pooling their private wealth and giving it all to those in need." The Lay-Faithful Church is the Kingdom, but the Vatican is the anti-Kingdom. By not removing it's perps & pervs, the Holy See makes its position clear."
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Allen first published at 9 yrs old. Old Rails' Tales, (Trafford) was reviewed by NYT as one of the best books of the year. He recently published in observance of the forthcoming Reagan Centennial, two books: Ronald Reagan & The Evil Empire: a fictional autobiography of Ronald Reagan (abridged edition); and, American Civilian Counter-terrorist Manual: a fictional autobiography of Ronald Reagan (unabridged edition); his books are available from Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Trafford.
i missed me after the terror, during the years of unbearable sorrow
Available May 15, 2010 from Ingram; Baker & Taylor, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Trafford.
For pdf review copies or to schedule interview requests, contact: Alan Kernoff
Tel: 1-925 812-3391 Email: press4imissedme@gmail.com
(Note: only pdf files are available at this time.)
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.mmdnewswire.com/abusing-children-8064.html
Ex-cop: Child prostitution marks new low for mafia
April 21, 2010 10:03 a.m. EDT
Among the defendants in a federal indictment unsealed Tuesday was 43-year-old Suzanne Porcelli.STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Suzanne Porcelli is only female among 14 accused in indictment unsealed Tuesday
Porcelli, 43, faces four counts related to underaged prostitution ring that used Craigslist
Charges in 23-count indictment range from racketeering, murder, sex trafficking of a minor
(CNN) -- The mafia has traditionally maintained respect for women and children, but allegations the Gambino crime family was involved in underage prostitution may mean the last vestiges of mob reverence are gone, authorities said.
To some observers, seeing a woman among the defendants in a federal indictment, unsealed Tuesday, was just as shocking as charges the syndicate was peddling teens to customers in New Jersey and three New York boroughs.
Suzanne Porcelli, 43, was the only female among 14 reputed Gambino crime family members and associates indicted on charges including racketeering, murder, sex trafficking of a minor, extortion and drug trafficking.
Thirteen defendants, including Porcelli, entered not guilty pleas Tuesday, according to the U.S. attorney's office, and they are expected to appear Wednesday before a federal judge who has been appointed to the case.
"It's extremely rare to grab up a woman in an organized crime case because it's a male-oriented criminal society," said FBI special agent Richard Kolko. "It's certainly unusual, but as you can see in the indictment, she allegedly committed a serious crime and will face those charges."
Fifteen FBI agents showed up at the door of the single mother's home in Brooklyn to arrest her at 6 a.m. Tuesday, said her lawyer, Vincent Romano. She was released on bond.
Porcelli's name appears only six times in the 60-page document detailing a litany of accusations against suspected members and associates of the Gambino crime family. The list runs the gamut from murder to OxyContin trafficking to defrauding high-end restaurants with inflated invoices for meat orders.
Read about the charges against the 14 accused
Porcelli is charged with four counts in a sex trafficking ring involving some underaged girls, and not for charges of murder or racketeering-related activity.
Video: Gambino crime family under fire
Timeline: Gambino crime family RELATED TOPICS
Organized Crime
Gambino Crime Family
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Human Trafficking
"It's a very unfortunate situation for her. Obviously she's not a member or associate of any crime family. She's charged in a very limited conduct in the indictment," Romano said. "I'd like to get discovery and see what the evidence is against her, who's allegedly cooperating with the government against her to see what they have to say and assess the situation."
However slight her alleged role, having a woman caught up in an underage prostitution ring with the Gambino crime family marks a turn for the worse in organized crime, said Joe Coffey, a former commanding officer of the New York Police Department's organized crime unit.
"The mob as we know it historically holds very few things sacred, but they do hold women and children sacred," said Coffey.
"Women have been girlfriends and wives and mothers, but never has there been any case where a female becomes an influential person in mob operations, because it's seen as men's work, something that women and children should be protected from and kept out of."
Porcelli's name appears alongside the likes of 69-year-old Daniel Marino, a longtime member and current Gambino family boss, according to court documents. Porcelli is also accused of working with alleged Gambino family soldier Thomas Orefice, who is accused of a "staggering crime spree" related to most of the criminal enterprises in the indictment.
Porcelli faces four charges, including sex trafficking and sex trafficking of a minor, for her alleged role in an interstate sex trafficking ring in 2008 and 2009.
Orefice is accused of devising and executing the business plan for the prostitution ring, in which underage girls, including at least one 15-year-old, were offered up to paying customers in Manhattan, Brooklyn, New Jersey and Staten Island, according to court documents.
The defendants advertised their service on Craigslist and other websites, and had customers call a phone line operated by Porcelli to arrange appointments, the documents state.
"Orefice and the other defendants also made the young women available for sex to the players at regular poker games that Orefice and his crew ran."
Porcelli faces a potential life sentence on one count of sex trafficking of a minor.
Sex and drugs are nothing new to organized crime, says Coffey, but their expanding prominence within day-to-day operations reflects the weakening mores of the mafia and society.
"The mafia, as we know it today, is no longer what it was. Although they've always been ruthless, greedy, unlawful, murderous, they always had a certain amount of respect, i.e., for women and children," he said.
A law enforcement crackdown in the 1970s and 1980s targeting organized crime's leadership left a power vacuum that has been filled by leaders with a greater appetite for sex and drugs, he said.
"The mob, as we see it today, has lost all respect, lost all the historical culture that it was intended to have since 1931, and that's because they're becoming their own best customers within the drug culture."
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/04/21/gambino.female.defendant/?hpt=Sbin
Human Rights Day: FBI agent offers ways to stop human trafficking
The Tribune-Star
TERRE HAUTE — Drug trafficking in the Wabash Valley makes headlines all too frequently these days.
Human trafficking, not so much.
But the illegal practice of exploiting people for labor, sex and servitude does happen in America all the time, and it is conceivable that a small-scale operation could be active in cities the size of Terre Haute.
FBI agent Michael Prendergast talked about “Making the Case Against Trafficking” as one of the speakers at the Ninth Annual Human Rights Day at Indiana State University on Tuesday.
“One of the key reasons for trafficking is money, no matter what kind of trafficking,” Prendergast said.
Even in Indiana, Americans are used to seeing seasonal migrant workers come in to work at farms harvesting vegetables and fruits and doing labor that is too exhaustive, tedious or low-paying for U.S. citizens. But even though those migrant workers are sometimes found to live in horrendous conditions, Prendergast said, they are voluntary workers and many of them send a portion of their pay to their native countries to help other relatives.
There have been cases, however, where migrant workers are actually “slaves” who have paid their way to be illegally smuggled into the U.S. and now are working off their debt by earning wages for the human trafficker.
In another recent case, a sex ring was uncovered at a northern Indiana massage parlor operation that extended to several affluent cities. While each business seemed harmless in practice, and did offer massages, it also offered sex services for an extra fee.
The women involved, Prendergast said, turned out to be Koreans who spoke no English and had been taught to fear the American police, so it was not easy to get them to cooperate with the investigation. What tipped police off was the high volume of customers through the business, the large bank deposits made by the business managers and absence of employees leaving or returning to work daily. The women were held captive at the business.
While people in the Wabash Valley can look around and say that they don’t see those types of suspect businesses anywhere, there is still another source for human trafficking that most Americans have in their homes these days – the Internet.
The people photographed or videotaped in pornographic scenes are often victims of exploitation, particularly young women and especially children. While the pornography may originate in places far overseas, Prendergast said, cybercrime is just around the corner when people view and download the porn.
The FBI has shifted its influence to cyberspace in recent years, Prendergast said, because that is where a lot of the human trafficking is evident.
The women used as slaves come from a variety of countries, mostly in Southeast Asia, Africa, India and former Soviet-bloc countries. The industry has become so specialized that customers can pick the age, ethnicity, size and profiles of the sex slaves that they want to purchase, he said.
While the FBI has become more involved and effective in tracking and breaking up human trafficking rings that operate in the U.S. and elsewhere, Prendergast said there is no easy way to eradicate human trafficking overnight.
The ISU event included campus and community partners to talk about the issue of human rights.
Student-made posters highlighted facts such as:
• 2 million people are trafficked worldwide every year, according to the U.S. State Department.
• The average cost of a slave around the world is $90.
• Eighty percent of trafficking involves sexual exploitation, and 19 percent involves labor exploitation.
• Half of those exploited around the world are younger than 18.
• Each year, 1 million children are forced into the sex trade, and 244,000 American children are at risk of sexual exploitation.
Respectfully submitted from: http://tribstar.com/news/x993507071/Human-Rights-Day-FBI-agent-offers-ways-to-stop-human-trafficking
Teen recounts horror of abduction into sex slavery
By Mike Celizic
updated 2:37 p.m. ET
Many young victims of human traffickers treated as criminals themselves
For someone who’s only 18, Shauna Newell is remarkably composed as she describes being kidnapped, drugged, gang-raped and savagely beaten.
It is only when she talks about seeing one of the men who sexually assaulted her — free and unafraid of being prosecuted — that she starts to break down.
“I went out to the beach a few weeks ago and I saw the dude who raped me, and he just looked at me,” Newell told NBC News, her voice choking. “Like, hey … you ruined my whole life. You have scarred me for the rest of my life and you're just sitting there going on with your life like nothing is wrong.”
Human traffic
As shocking as Newell’s story is, it is not unique, TODAY’s Natalie Morales said Thursday in a special report entitled “Sex Slaves in the Suburbs.” Advocates for girls and young women who are forced into prostitution by people who approach them in various ways, including on the Internet, claim that thousands of American youths are victims of human traffickers.
Like Newell, many are treated by law enforcement authorities as runaways, said Marc Klaas, who founded the advocacy group KlaasKids after his own 12-year-old daughter was abducted, raped and killed. When they are forced into prostitution, the young people are the ones who are prosecuted, Klaas told TODAY’s Meredith Vieira Thursday in New York.
“It turns upside down,” Klaas explained. “First of all, many of these kids are missing children. But what happens is when they’re trafficked, they’re turned into hookers; they’re turned into prostitutes. So we find this situation where we find these young victims, these young girls that all of a sudden are being treated and looked upon as criminals.”
At least in that regard, Newell was fortunate when she was abducted two years ago. Thanks to her mother and Klaas’ organization, which organized a search for her, she was rescued after three days. She’s gone public to warn other girls about how easy it is to be kidnapped and trafficked.
Sinister sleepover
A typical 16-year-old in a middle-class home in suburban Pensacola, Fla., Newell’s nightmare began innocently enough: A new friend she had met in high school asked her to come to her home for a sleepover.
Newell’s mother, Lisa Brant, didn’t like the idea, but after weeks of lobbying by her daughter, Brant met with the girl and the man she said was her father to make sure her daughter would be safe.
But the girl’s “father” was really a convicted felon, and the girl, who had a record of prostitution in Texas, was an accomplice in the abduction. “Her dad took us to this house and said he'd be right back and he left us there,” Newell recounted in a taped interview. “And I asked for some water because I was thirsty. And I drank the water and I blacked out.”
The water had been laced with a drug. When she woke up, Newell was groggy and couldn’t move.
Marc Klaas, whose KlaasKids Foundation works to stop crimes against children.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“My legs were being held down, and the guy that was raping me was holding my hands back,” she said in a quiet voice. “I kept screaming, ‘Stop, please don't do this. Leave me alone.’ But I was so weak, I couldn't fight them off. Like I was, I was so really out of it. And I blacked out a few times and I kept coming back to. And I was still being raped every time I woke up.”
Left alone for a moment, Newell managed to call her mother.
“My cell phone rang. And all I heard was, ‘Mommy, help me,’ ” Brant said. “And the phone went dead. And I freaked!”
She called police, but they told her that Newell had probably run away from home, and they wouldn’t be able to treat it as a missing-person case until 72 hours had elapsed.
“He was like, 'Oh, well, you know, there's nothing I can do. You know teenagers,’ ” Brant said.
A stroke of luck
With law enforcement unwilling to act, Brant and Newell’s siblings started their own search. They were fortunate in that Brad Dennis, an investigator for KlaasKids, was based in the area because the Florida Panhandle is an epicenter of human trafficking.
By sheer luck, one search party stopped at a convenience store for something to drink, and Newell’s 14-year-old brother spotted his sister in the back seat of another car that had stopped at the same store. She was rescued, but her abductors managed to flee.
After three days of being raped and beaten and drugged, Newell was dirty, bloody, bruised and barely alive. She was airlifted to a hospital and had to be resuscitated twice. In addition to her serious injuries, she had been infected with an STD.
Newell said that her captor told her she had been sold on the Internet for $300,000 to a man in Texas. Fortunately, she was rescued before delivery could be made. During Newell’s ordeal in Florida, her captor took money from a number of men who raped her. When she screamed, he held a gun to her head and threatened to blow her brains out.
TODAY
Lisa Brant, whose daughter, Shauna Newell, was abducted and gang-raped.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Afraid for her life, Newell later moved in with her boyfriend and now has a child of her own. Her family continues to lobby for national legislation that will provide aid for Americans forced into the sex trade similar to aid that is provided for girls and boys who are brought into the country and forced into prostitution.
Vieira asked Lisa Brant what advice she has for other girls.
“Listen to your parents. Just don’t stop believing. Be strong,” she said. “Follow what your parents say fully, fully. There are people out there who will help you. Speak up. Everybody needs to speak up. Girls that have gone through this, they’re scared.”
Tune in to “Sex Slaves in the Suburbs” at 6 p.m. ET Nov. 15 on MSNBC.
For more information about the KlaasKids Foundation, visit klaaskids.org. If you have been a victim of an experience like Shauna Newell’s, you can e-mail the makers of “Sex Slaves in the Suburbs” at info@santokiproductions.com .
Read more: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/27098993/ns/today-today_people/#ixzz0lskwr1xQ
updated 2:37 p.m. ET
Many young victims of human traffickers treated as criminals themselves
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
For someone who’s only 18, Shauna Newell is remarkably composed as she describes being kidnapped, drugged, gang-raped and savagely beaten.
It is only when she talks about seeing one of the men who sexually assaulted her — free and unafraid of being prosecuted — that she starts to break down.
“I went out to the beach a few weeks ago and I saw the dude who raped me, and he just looked at me,” Newell told NBC News, her voice choking. “Like, hey … you ruined my whole life. You have scarred me for the rest of my life and you're just sitting there going on with your life like nothing is wrong.”
Human traffic
As shocking as Newell’s story is, it is not unique, TODAY’s Natalie Morales said Thursday in a special report entitled “Sex Slaves in the Suburbs.” Advocates for girls and young women who are forced into prostitution by people who approach them in various ways, including on the Internet, claim that thousands of American youths are victims of human traffickers.
Like Newell, many are treated by law enforcement authorities as runaways, said Marc Klaas, who founded the advocacy group KlaasKids after his own 12-year-old daughter was abducted, raped and killed. When they are forced into prostitution, the young people are the ones who are prosecuted, Klaas told TODAY’s Meredith Vieira Thursday in New York.
“It turns upside down,” Klaas explained. “First of all, many of these kids are missing children. But what happens is when they’re trafficked, they’re turned into hookers; they’re turned into prostitutes. So we find this situation where we find these young victims, these young girls that all of a sudden are being treated and looked upon as criminals.”
At least in that regard, Newell was fortunate when she was abducted two years ago. Thanks to her mother and Klaas’ organization, which organized a search for her, she was rescued after three days. She’s gone public to warn other girls about how easy it is to be kidnapped and trafficked.
Sinister sleepover
A typical 16-year-old in a middle-class home in suburban Pensacola, Fla., Newell’s nightmare began innocently enough: A new friend she had met in high school asked her to come to her home for a sleepover.
Newell’s mother, Lisa Brant, didn’t like the idea, but after weeks of lobbying by her daughter, Brant met with the girl and the man she said was her father to make sure her daughter would be safe.
But the girl’s “father” was really a convicted felon, and the girl, who had a record of prostitution in Texas, was an accomplice in the abduction. “Her dad took us to this house and said he'd be right back and he left us there,” Newell recounted in a taped interview. “And I asked for some water because I was thirsty. And I drank the water and I blacked out.”
The water had been laced with a drug. When she woke up, Newell was groggy and couldn’t move.
Marc Klaas, whose KlaasKids Foundation works to stop crimes against children.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“My legs were being held down, and the guy that was raping me was holding my hands back,” she said in a quiet voice. “I kept screaming, ‘Stop, please don't do this. Leave me alone.’ But I was so weak, I couldn't fight them off. Like I was, I was so really out of it. And I blacked out a few times and I kept coming back to. And I was still being raped every time I woke up.”
Left alone for a moment, Newell managed to call her mother.
“My cell phone rang. And all I heard was, ‘Mommy, help me,’ ” Brant said. “And the phone went dead. And I freaked!”
She called police, but they told her that Newell had probably run away from home, and they wouldn’t be able to treat it as a missing-person case until 72 hours had elapsed.
“He was like, 'Oh, well, you know, there's nothing I can do. You know teenagers,’ ” Brant said.
A stroke of luck
With law enforcement unwilling to act, Brant and Newell’s siblings started their own search. They were fortunate in that Brad Dennis, an investigator for KlaasKids, was based in the area because the Florida Panhandle is an epicenter of human trafficking.
By sheer luck, one search party stopped at a convenience store for something to drink, and Newell’s 14-year-old brother spotted his sister in the back seat of another car that had stopped at the same store. She was rescued, but her abductors managed to flee.
After three days of being raped and beaten and drugged, Newell was dirty, bloody, bruised and barely alive. She was airlifted to a hospital and had to be resuscitated twice. In addition to her serious injuries, she had been infected with an STD.
Newell said that her captor told her she had been sold on the Internet for $300,000 to a man in Texas. Fortunately, she was rescued before delivery could be made. During Newell’s ordeal in Florida, her captor took money from a number of men who raped her. When she screamed, he held a gun to her head and threatened to blow her brains out.
TODAY
Lisa Brant, whose daughter, Shauna Newell, was abducted and gang-raped.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Afraid for her life, Newell later moved in with her boyfriend and now has a child of her own. Her family continues to lobby for national legislation that will provide aid for Americans forced into the sex trade similar to aid that is provided for girls and boys who are brought into the country and forced into prostitution.
Vieira asked Lisa Brant what advice she has for other girls.
“Listen to your parents. Just don’t stop believing. Be strong,” she said. “Follow what your parents say fully, fully. There are people out there who will help you. Speak up. Everybody needs to speak up. Girls that have gone through this, they’re scared.”
Tune in to “Sex Slaves in the Suburbs” at 6 p.m. ET Nov. 15 on MSNBC.
For more information about the KlaasKids Foundation, visit klaaskids.org. If you have been a victim of an experience like Shauna Newell’s, you can e-mail the makers of “Sex Slaves in the Suburbs” at info@santokiproductions.com .
Read more: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/27098993/ns/today-today_people/#ixzz0lskwr1xQ
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Tracy Ocasio: New search planned for missing woman
A new tip in the disappearance of Ocoee resident Tracy Ocasio has sparked an upcoming search for the missing woman.
Joe Ocasio, the missing woman's father, said he and volunteers with a local chapter of the Central Florida Search & Rescue will mount a search in Ocoee and MetroWest on May 8.
Her father did not give details about the tip, but said the group will search the area near the Florida Tap Room in MetroWest — the last place Tracy Ocasio had been seen.
"During the last month, this search group has been using the Ocoee area for ‘search' training exercises," her father wrote in a recent e-mail to the media. "On a recent search they found an iPod which at first we thought it was Tracy's…"
Officials determined it was not her iPod after it was examined by a lab, he added.
Joe Ocasio maintains that James Virgil Hataway, who is being held on an unrelated attempted first-degree murder charge in Seminole County, was involved.
Hataway has not been charged in her disappearance.
Tracy Ocasio vanished May 27 from the MetroWest sports bar during an Orlando Magic NBA playoff run. She was last seen leaving the bar with Hataway.
Her car was found a half-mile from his home, police records show.
Hataway told investigators Ocasio, then 27, gave him a ride home and then left.
Hataway is being held at the Seminole County Jail.
Hataway is expected to have a pretrial conference Thursday. He is accused of attacking a woman on Aug. 7, 2008.
A woman told authorities she gave Hataway a ride and was dropping him off when he choked her, tried to snap her neck and banged her head into the ground.
His charges include attempted first-degree murder and false imprisonment.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/breakingnews/os-tracy-ocasio-search-20100420,0,115019.story
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Police file child porn charges
By JILLIAN DUCHNOWSKI
Created: Saturday, April 17, 2010
WOODSTOCK – Three Lake in the Hills roommates face more charges after authorities found nude photographs on their computer of the 14-year-old girl they allegedly prostituted.
Authorities this week filed seven child-pornography charges each against Donald R. Jones, 52, Antwanette R. Atkins, 42, and Kari Knox, 35. The trio were charged in January with involuntary servitude of a minor and juvenile pimping, the more serious of which is punishable with between six and 30 years in prison.
Under the new charges, the trio is accused of creating and disseminating child pornography Dec. 31.
During a January hearing in which Jones asked a judge to lower his bail, prosecutors said Jones took partially nude photographs of a girl from Wichita, Kan., and created online prostitution advertisements.
Jones met the girl on My-Space, drove there to pick her up, and had sex with her in a hotel. She stayed with Jones and his roommates in Lake in the Hills for a couple of days and twice had sex with men for money, which ultimately was given to Jones, prosecutors said.
The girl reported the incident to Wichita, Kan., police, who contacted local police Jan. 8.
Jones also has been charged with kidnapping and aggravated trafficking in Sedgwick County, Kan.
Respctfully submitted from: http://www.nwherald.com/articles/2010/04/16/r_xayzlrkwrfizscubejstsg/index.xml
21-Year-Old Victim of Human Trafficking is Back Home in Fresno
Last Update: 4/17 1:23 pm
CBS47 On Your Side and the Los Angeles Police Department teamed up to take down a trafficking operation in Los Angeles.
A 21-year-old victim is safe and back home in Fresno. She was held against her will by a man who threatened to kill her.
The woman met the man who became her pimp on a site for Harry Potter fans. He offered her a way to make a lot of money. She ended up forced into a life of prostitution that nearly cost her her life.
"He found me and he was instant messaging me and saying 'add me as a friend' and he was jus talking," said Jane.
The woman, we'll call "Jane," said her on-line friend convinced her to go with him to Los Angeles. He picked her up and took her to L.A. with three other women who were 18 to 21 years old.
He took pictures of Jane and posted them to on-line sites like CraigsList and sites that advertise sex for sale. Jane was told she would give massages to men.
"I didn't really want to think that they were directing me to something else, but like in the back of my mind I kind of knew what they wanted me to do," Jane said.
Gradually they convinced her to do more and have sex with men who responded to the ads.
"Well they charged the guys like $200 an hour, and they had me give them all the money. I didn't get to keep any of it," said Jane.
After three weeks,and abuse by her pimp, Jane decided to leave. She text messaged her cousin Robert Medina in Fresno asking, "How much was a ticket home?"
"That's when he took my phone and I tried to leave and he didn't let me. He threatened me. He said I was his and he said if I tried to leave him he would try and kill me," said Jane.
Jane's contact with her family stopped. Medina kept sending messages until finally there was a response. He got a text message saying "She's in peace" and the last text said, "You want her? Go find her. I left her on Beverly Blvd. and Genessee La Cienega. Now leave me alone."
Medina came to CBS47 for help. Our staff relayed Jane's cell phone number to police in Los Angeles. With that information, detectives were able to find Jane and her pimp in a hotel in Long Beach and arrested him.
"They took him away and they told me I was safe now," said Jane.
"Words can't explain the way I feel right now having my family member back," said Medina.
Carissa Phelps, from the Central Valley Freedom Coalition, said women are forced into prostitution more often than you think.
"They are often times prisoners sometimes drugged and they're trapped. They are in fear for their lives; they've been threatened," said Phelps.
Jane said she wanted to tell her story to protect other women from being lured into prostitution.
"I want them to be careful and not make the same mistake I did and not leave with somebody likfe that and not let them talk you into it by saying that you can make a lot of money," said Jane.
Jane was rescued at 4 a.m. Friday. She's is now safe and back home in Fresno. Her alleged pimp is in custody in Los Angeles.
If you know someone who's been a victim of prostitution, there is a national hotline to help. The number is (888) 373-7888.
Respectfully submmitted from: http://www.cbs47.tv/news/local/story/Exclusive-21-Year-Old-Victim-of-Human-Trafficking/LOpNuDdEdUCV4nVkdgDXtg.cspx
Friday, April 16, 2010
Reward $ raised from 4/19/2010 - 5/19/2010 for Amy Fitzpatrick!
The million euro has been donated by four anonymous friends of the family of missing girl AMY FITZPATRICK.
Amy Fitzpatrick was 15 when she went missing in the Costa de Sol in 2008.
Irish expat Amy Fitzpatrick was 15 when she vanished as she walked home from a friend's house on the Costa de Sol in January 2008.
Police have failed to find any trace of her since she disappeared.
The million euro has been donated by four anonymous friends of ours.
This reward is for us to get Amy back one way or another.
Some days we hope and pray Amy ran away but we know that's not the truth.
Two years and three and a half months after her disappearance that's impossible.
Some days we think she's alive, other days we think she's dead.
Not knowing what's happened to her is awful.
We're desperately hoping Amy's still alive but if she's not we want to know and we want her back so we can grieve her loss and put her to rest.
The reward money will be made available for a month between April 19 and May 19.
We believe someone knows something about Amy's disappearance.
We are going through hell and we want to find out what's happened to her either way.
The month means they have a time limit. If they're not going to give Amy up after a month after this long time, we think they never will.
We promised the cash will be made available to anyone whose information will lead to our daughter's discovery.
It will be paid 15 days after she is found alive - or 15 days after police certify her dead.
All calls will remain anonymous should anyone have information.
Respectfully submitted from: http://missingamy.net/
Mexico leads countries in UN ‘Blue Heart’ human trafficking campaign
“I admire Mexico’s leadership in fighting this modern slavery demonstrated through its strong commitment to the ‘Blue Heart’ campaign,” said Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), which spearheaded the global campaign.
“Since almost everything we consume has been stained by the blood, sweat and tears of trafficking victims, we have a shared responsibility to act,” Mr. Costa added, saying that taking action against human trafficking is not just the responsibility of governments.
As part of Mexico’s launch, more than a dozen emblematic buildings were lit up in blue across the capital, Mexico City, in a symbolic act to raise awareness about the Blue Heart campaign.
More than 2.4 million people – up to 80 per cent women and girls – are currently being exploited as victims of human trafficking, either for sexual or labour exploitation, the UN has said. Other forms of human trafficking include domestic servitude, the removal of organs and the exploitation of children.
“I was blindfolded and forced into a car,” a Guatemalan child told the UN Information Service in Vienna (UNIS).
The girl – just six years old at the time – was forcibly removed from her home by a child trafficking ring and taken to a brothel in Cancun. She is now taking refuge in a shelter for human trafficking survivors in Mexico City.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called last week for strengthened global cooperation and more innovation in the battle against organized crime.
He also urged governments to ratify and implement the 10-year-old UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and its three additional Protocols, which aim to suppress trafficking in persons, the smuggling of migrants, and the illicit manufacturing of and trafficking in firearms and ammunition.
In June, Spain is expected be the next country to join the Blue Heart global awareness campaign.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=34383&Cr=human+trafficking&Cr1=
Calif man arrested in human trafficking, rape case
(AP) – 1 hour ago
LEMOORE, Calif. — A Central California man faces human trafficking and sexual assault charges after a 20-year-old man allegedly escaped a house bound in duct tape.
Lemoore police arrested 47-year-old Randy Lee Chiles on Thursday.
Police say Chiles' neighbors reported that the terrified man had knocked on a door in a quiet cul-de-sac Monday wearing torn boxers and duct tape around his ankles. The alleged victim told neighbors he'd been held hostage and raped.
Police say the victim escaped after he heard that his captor had planned to sell him. They declined to release any other details about the case.
Chiles is being held on suspicion of human trafficking, sodomy, false imprisonment, assault and other charges. He's being held on $315,000 bail.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hkLecFvk9KPvJXW_feMLo3dB_whwD9F4ER3G0
LEMOORE, Calif. — A Central California man faces human trafficking and sexual assault charges after a 20-year-old man allegedly escaped a house bound in duct tape.
Lemoore police arrested 47-year-old Randy Lee Chiles on Thursday.
Police say Chiles' neighbors reported that the terrified man had knocked on a door in a quiet cul-de-sac Monday wearing torn boxers and duct tape around his ankles. The alleged victim told neighbors he'd been held hostage and raped.
Police say the victim escaped after he heard that his captor had planned to sell him. They declined to release any other details about the case.
Chiles is being held on suspicion of human trafficking, sodomy, false imprisonment, assault and other charges. He's being held on $315,000 bail.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hkLecFvk9KPvJXW_feMLo3dB_whwD9F4ER3G0
Chinese woman gets death for child trafficking
WUHAN - A court in central China's Hubei Province Friday sentenced a woman to death and another two to life in prison for trafficking more than 40 children.
The 23-member child trafficking ring were convicted of buying 49 children from Shizong County in southwestern Yunnan Province and selling them to people in Shexian County in northern Hebei Province, the Wuhan Railway Transport Intermediate Court said in a statement.
The ring, busted in May and June last year, sold the boys for up to 40,000 yuan ($5,860) and girls for up to 20,000 yuan each between March 2005 and July 2009.
The court handed down the death sentence to Yu Lixiang, the ringleader, for trafficking 33 children and causing one to death. Du Minghua and Yu's sister Yu Xiaofen were sentenced to life in prison in the first-instance trial.
The rest 20 accomplices were sentenced to two to 15 years in prison.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2010-04/17/content_9742052.htm
The 23-member child trafficking ring were convicted of buying 49 children from Shizong County in southwestern Yunnan Province and selling them to people in Shexian County in northern Hebei Province, the Wuhan Railway Transport Intermediate Court said in a statement.
The ring, busted in May and June last year, sold the boys for up to 40,000 yuan ($5,860) and girls for up to 20,000 yuan each between March 2005 and July 2009.
The court handed down the death sentence to Yu Lixiang, the ringleader, for trafficking 33 children and causing one to death. Du Minghua and Yu's sister Yu Xiaofen were sentenced to life in prison in the first-instance trial.
The rest 20 accomplices were sentenced to two to 15 years in prison.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2010-04/17/content_9742052.htm
Local medical workers learn how to spot human trafficking victims
BLADE STAFF
Medical staff and field inspectors from the Lucas County Health Department were trained Friday morning to recognize and record signs of prostitution and human trafficking using a new form.
Recording details on the form is the latest effort to combat sex trafficking in Toledo - which has emerged in national investigations as a major hub for the recruitment of women and girls traded cross country as prostitutes. In 2005, a federal investigation into a child prostitution ring in Harrisburg, Pa., revealed that nine area girls had been sold as slaves and that at least 12 of 31 people charged had ties to the city.
The form reads that "a victim of trafficking may look like many of the people we serve everyday" and includes a checklist of general signs of violence. Staff may check boxes that indicate the woman would not speak on her own behalf; does not have proper identification; has physical bruising or injuries, and a "tattoo with a male's name on any part of the body, but especially on the neck, arm, wrist, and back."
Perhaps the form would come in handy if a woman seems quiet or fearful as a man is asking for a replacement birth certificate on her behalf, said Mary Jay, disease intervention specialist for the health department.
"We just want to send out a message that if you're a victim of trafficking, you can come here," Ms. Jay said.
Respectfully submitted from: http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100416/NEWS16/100419792
Medical staff and field inspectors from the Lucas County Health Department were trained Friday morning to recognize and record signs of prostitution and human trafficking using a new form.
Recording details on the form is the latest effort to combat sex trafficking in Toledo - which has emerged in national investigations as a major hub for the recruitment of women and girls traded cross country as prostitutes. In 2005, a federal investigation into a child prostitution ring in Harrisburg, Pa., revealed that nine area girls had been sold as slaves and that at least 12 of 31 people charged had ties to the city.
The form reads that "a victim of trafficking may look like many of the people we serve everyday" and includes a checklist of general signs of violence. Staff may check boxes that indicate the woman would not speak on her own behalf; does not have proper identification; has physical bruising or injuries, and a "tattoo with a male's name on any part of the body, but especially on the neck, arm, wrist, and back."
Perhaps the form would come in handy if a woman seems quiet or fearful as a man is asking for a replacement birth certificate on her behalf, said Mary Jay, disease intervention specialist for the health department.
"We just want to send out a message that if you're a victim of trafficking, you can come here," Ms. Jay said.
Respectfully submitted from: http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100416/NEWS16/100419792
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Human smuggling network busted
Posted Thursday April 15, 2010
PHOENIX (Reuters) - U.S. police arrested 47 people and broke up a human smuggling network that used rogue shuttle firms to ferry thousands of illegal immigrants from the Arizona-Mexico border across the United States, authorities said on Thursday.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE, said those arrested included the owners and employees of five Arizona commercial shuttle companies, following a year-long operation involving U.S. and Mexican police.
"Forty-seven people have been arrested today ... five shuttle companies have been shut down, and multiple smuggling routes have been stopped in their tracks," ICE Assistant Secretary John Morton told a news conference in Phoenix.
"Today we are not seeking to prosecute a given smuggler, a given shuttle company ... we are seeking to take down an entire alien smuggling industry," he added.
Arizona straddles a heavily trafficked corridor for both human and drug smugglers from Mexico.
Last year, U.S. Border Patrol agents made more than 241,000 arrests in the sector south of Tucson, Arizona, and seized more than 60 tonnes of marijuana.
Morton said the shuttle companies targeted in the operation moved illegal immigrants north from the border city of Nogales to Tucson and Phoenix, using fake bus receipts in a bid to make the shuttle trips appear legitimate.
The network then moved the migrants, most of them from Mexico and Central America, although some from as far away as China, to cities across the United States, including Los Angeles, Chicago and New York.
Criminal indictments handed down in the case charged defendants with federal crimes including money laundering, alien smuggling and conspiracy charges.
A conviction for conspiracy to transport illegal aliens carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail.
Dennis K. Burke, U.S. Attorney for the District of Arizona, said cooperation between nine federal, state and local police agencies involved, as well as Mexican police, was "unprecedented."
"There is ... a chain from Arizona-Mexico border through Nogales to Phoenix and then branching out through the United States, today ... that chain is broken," Burke said.
"It will be extremely difficult to repair that chain, it is a missing link that greatly disrupts the infrastructure of human smuggling organizations."
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.wsau.com/news/articles/2010/apr/15/human-smuggling-network-busted/
PHOENIX (Reuters) - U.S. police arrested 47 people and broke up a human smuggling network that used rogue shuttle firms to ferry thousands of illegal immigrants from the Arizona-Mexico border across the United States, authorities said on Thursday.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE, said those arrested included the owners and employees of five Arizona commercial shuttle companies, following a year-long operation involving U.S. and Mexican police.
"Forty-seven people have been arrested today ... five shuttle companies have been shut down, and multiple smuggling routes have been stopped in their tracks," ICE Assistant Secretary John Morton told a news conference in Phoenix.
"Today we are not seeking to prosecute a given smuggler, a given shuttle company ... we are seeking to take down an entire alien smuggling industry," he added.
Arizona straddles a heavily trafficked corridor for both human and drug smugglers from Mexico.
Last year, U.S. Border Patrol agents made more than 241,000 arrests in the sector south of Tucson, Arizona, and seized more than 60 tonnes of marijuana.
Morton said the shuttle companies targeted in the operation moved illegal immigrants north from the border city of Nogales to Tucson and Phoenix, using fake bus receipts in a bid to make the shuttle trips appear legitimate.
The network then moved the migrants, most of them from Mexico and Central America, although some from as far away as China, to cities across the United States, including Los Angeles, Chicago and New York.
Criminal indictments handed down in the case charged defendants with federal crimes including money laundering, alien smuggling and conspiracy charges.
A conviction for conspiracy to transport illegal aliens carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail.
Dennis K. Burke, U.S. Attorney for the District of Arizona, said cooperation between nine federal, state and local police agencies involved, as well as Mexican police, was "unprecedented."
"There is ... a chain from Arizona-Mexico border through Nogales to Phoenix and then branching out through the United States, today ... that chain is broken," Burke said.
"It will be extremely difficult to repair that chain, it is a missing link that greatly disrupts the infrastructure of human smuggling organizations."
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.wsau.com/news/articles/2010/apr/15/human-smuggling-network-busted/
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Campaigner's warning as first cases of men being trafficked into Scotland as sex slaves are revealed
Apr 13 2010 By Annie Brown
MEN have been trafficked into Scotland to be used as gay sex slaves.
In the first known cases of male sex trafficking to hit Scotland, two men were smuggled in from Africa and imprisoned in flats.
The men were victims of separate incidents. One was forced to take part in pornography, while the other was sold for sex.
Experts fear that more victims could follow.
Julian Heng, who manages a support project for male prostitutes, said his organisation were called in to help the men.
He said: "We have had a couple of requests for telephone support for professionals who were supporting two separate cases of men who had been trafficked into the country.
"They weren't asylum seekers or refugees, they had actually been trafficked into Scotland from Africa."
There are around 700 trafficked women in the UK but when men are trafficked here, it tends to be for manual labour - not sex.
Mr Heng, who is service manager of NHS Open Road, said the male sex trade often mirrored what happened to women.
He said: "Whatever happens with women involved in prostitution, we will usually see happening with men. It tends to take a couple of years, that's all.
"So just like we are aware of women being trafficked into Scotland for prostitution, I think we need to be aware that it will happen more with men.
"It is something we are going to have to be vigilant about. It is very much a new feature in Scotland but it is something that will happen here."
Both the men were in their twenties and were held captive in properties in Glasgow. Both thought they were here to work but were forced into sex acts.
In the first case a year ago, the young man who had been brought in for pornography managed to escape. He was desperate to go home and was flown back.
The second case was within the last three months.
Sex traffickers frequently subject victims to debt bondage - telling them they owe money for living expenses and transport and have to sell sex to repay the debt.
They condition their victims using starvation, confinement, beatings and rape or threats of violence to their families.
In Scotland, there were about 400 male escort listings on the web in 2008 and half were in the Greater Glasgow area.
There are around 100 men who work the streets. Some perform full sex for as little as £10.
Mr Heng said: "There is a Pretty Woman myth that it will be glamorous and well paid. The reality is grim and the majority of men are earning a pittance."
They will often have regular punters, which some of the men see as better the devil they know.
Contact is often made on mobile phones and the internet, where the pimp will be the gatekeeper.
Mr Heng said there was an even greater stigma attached to the men who were prostitutes. He said: "It is seen by some as acceptable for men to purchase sex from women but largely unacceptable for men to buy sex from other men."
Yet the male and female prostitutes often have the same clients. The punter isn't necessarily looking for unusual sex but the added power kick of brutality.
Like the men who buy from women, the punters are married with kids in most cases.
Mr Heng said: "It is not about the type of sex, it is about a power dynamic of being able to buy sex. You can call all the shots and it is often very aggressive."
Open Road offer counselling, access to sexual health services and support to the men to help them get out of prostitution.
Half of the male prostitutes working in Glasgow are actually straight despite their services always being bought by men.
Most are homeless and the idea that male prostitutes are gay men extending their sex life is a myth. Having been sexually abused as a child is a common denominator.
Mr Heng said: "The core harm that messes with their head is they have to perform unwanted sex.
"That sex is no more wanted by the gay men who are prostitutes than the heterosexual men. The shame aspect for both is huge.
"That is why there is no way of making prostitution safe. It doesn't work. You can't stop the physical or psychological harm."
The Open Road project, which has been going for three years, sees males from their late teens to their fifties. Most are in their twenties.
Mr Heng is on the consultation group for the End Prostitution Now campaign to ban the purchase of sex in Scotland. The nation has taken some steps to tackle street prostitution and has made buying sex in a public place an offence.
But men who buy sex indoors are committing no offence and that is flourishing.
Advertising for sexual services is now at an overwhelming level in newspapers, magazines, on TV and through the internet.
In Sweden, the prostitutes have been decriminal ised but the punters get punished.
The number of punters has dropped by 80 per cent and the number of women work ing Stockholm's streets has fallen from 2500 to 100 in 10 years.
And sex trafficking there has dropped to 200 women a year, while neighbouring Finland had 15,000.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2010/04/13/revealed-first-cases-of-men-being-trafficked-into-scotland-as-sex-slaves-86908-22182180/
MEN have been trafficked into Scotland to be used as gay sex slaves.
In the first known cases of male sex trafficking to hit Scotland, two men were smuggled in from Africa and imprisoned in flats.
The men were victims of separate incidents. One was forced to take part in pornography, while the other was sold for sex.
Experts fear that more victims could follow.
Julian Heng, who manages a support project for male prostitutes, said his organisation were called in to help the men.
He said: "We have had a couple of requests for telephone support for professionals who were supporting two separate cases of men who had been trafficked into the country.
"They weren't asylum seekers or refugees, they had actually been trafficked into Scotland from Africa."
There are around 700 trafficked women in the UK but when men are trafficked here, it tends to be for manual labour - not sex.
Mr Heng, who is service manager of NHS Open Road, said the male sex trade often mirrored what happened to women.
He said: "Whatever happens with women involved in prostitution, we will usually see happening with men. It tends to take a couple of years, that's all.
"So just like we are aware of women being trafficked into Scotland for prostitution, I think we need to be aware that it will happen more with men.
"It is something we are going to have to be vigilant about. It is very much a new feature in Scotland but it is something that will happen here."
Both the men were in their twenties and were held captive in properties in Glasgow. Both thought they were here to work but were forced into sex acts.
In the first case a year ago, the young man who had been brought in for pornography managed to escape. He was desperate to go home and was flown back.
The second case was within the last three months.
Sex traffickers frequently subject victims to debt bondage - telling them they owe money for living expenses and transport and have to sell sex to repay the debt.
They condition their victims using starvation, confinement, beatings and rape or threats of violence to their families.
In Scotland, there were about 400 male escort listings on the web in 2008 and half were in the Greater Glasgow area.
There are around 100 men who work the streets. Some perform full sex for as little as £10.
Mr Heng said: "There is a Pretty Woman myth that it will be glamorous and well paid. The reality is grim and the majority of men are earning a pittance."
They will often have regular punters, which some of the men see as better the devil they know.
Contact is often made on mobile phones and the internet, where the pimp will be the gatekeeper.
Mr Heng said there was an even greater stigma attached to the men who were prostitutes. He said: "It is seen by some as acceptable for men to purchase sex from women but largely unacceptable for men to buy sex from other men."
Yet the male and female prostitutes often have the same clients. The punter isn't necessarily looking for unusual sex but the added power kick of brutality.
Like the men who buy from women, the punters are married with kids in most cases.
Mr Heng said: "It is not about the type of sex, it is about a power dynamic of being able to buy sex. You can call all the shots and it is often very aggressive."
Open Road offer counselling, access to sexual health services and support to the men to help them get out of prostitution.
Half of the male prostitutes working in Glasgow are actually straight despite their services always being bought by men.
Most are homeless and the idea that male prostitutes are gay men extending their sex life is a myth. Having been sexually abused as a child is a common denominator.
Mr Heng said: "The core harm that messes with their head is they have to perform unwanted sex.
"That sex is no more wanted by the gay men who are prostitutes than the heterosexual men. The shame aspect for both is huge.
"That is why there is no way of making prostitution safe. It doesn't work. You can't stop the physical or psychological harm."
The Open Road project, which has been going for three years, sees males from their late teens to their fifties. Most are in their twenties.
Mr Heng is on the consultation group for the End Prostitution Now campaign to ban the purchase of sex in Scotland. The nation has taken some steps to tackle street prostitution and has made buying sex in a public place an offence.
But men who buy sex indoors are committing no offence and that is flourishing.
Advertising for sexual services is now at an overwhelming level in newspapers, magazines, on TV and through the internet.
In Sweden, the prostitutes have been decriminal ised but the punters get punished.
The number of punters has dropped by 80 per cent and the number of women work ing Stockholm's streets has fallen from 2500 to 100 in 10 years.
And sex trafficking there has dropped to 200 women a year, while neighbouring Finland had 15,000.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2010/04/13/revealed-first-cases-of-men-being-trafficked-into-scotland-as-sex-slaves-86908-22182180/
Addressing Human Trafficking in the Central Valley
By KSEE News
Story Published: Apr 14, 2010 at 6:29 PM EDT
Today's conference on human trafficking in Fresno brought together law enforcement and social services to discuss how to fight modern-day slavery. Tonight on KSEE 24 News at 6:00, Matt Otstot brings us one woman's amazing transformation from victim to crusader and her ongoing fight against child prostitution.
The National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC) is a national, toll-free hotline, available to answer calls from anywhere in the country, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year.
* To report a tip;
* To connect with anti-trafficking services in your area; or,
* To request training and technical assistance, general information or specific anti-trafficking resources.
Call:1-888-3737-888
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.ksee24.com/news/local/90882249.html
Victim escapes from human trafficking ring
15 April 2010, DUBAI — The Dubai Police recently nabbed five Arabs, including a couple, for allegedly bringing a woman to the country with a job offer and forcing her into prostitution.
All five have been referred to the prosecution mainly on the charge of running an international human trafficking ring, Dr Sultan Abdul Hameed Al Jamal, Director of the Human Trafficking Monitoring Centre of the police, said on Wednesday.
The 20-year-old Arab woman, who arrived in the country recently, called the police and said she was forced into prostitution but had managed to escape from the gang holding her up.
The police met the woman who said that she had meetings with some people who promised to find her a job in a hotel in the UAE. She gave them a cheque for Dh50,000 as demanded by them and they sent her a visa taken by a hotel. When she arrived in the country, a man and a woman met her at the airport and took her to their residence and took away her passport. A few days later, the woman explained to her that her job was to have sex with men but she refused. Enraged, the woman beat her up for days and threatened her that she would lodge a complaint against her for issuing a dud cheque.
The victim told the police that she agreed to work as a sex worker after this blackmail. But she managed to escape on the way to meet a member of the prostitution ring and called the police.
Officers of the CID asked the woman to contact the gang and return to their flat to round them all up at one go.
The police raided the flat as soon as the woman entered it and arrested the couple who are also from the complainant’s country and three others.
Al Jamal said the police have found a house for the woman to live and they would find her a job if she wished to stay in the country till the court procedures are completed.
He said they would issue a certificate showing that the complainant was forced to issue a dud cheque due to blackmail so that other members of the gang do not trap her by submitting the cheque in her country. They would also coordinate with police authorities of her country to nab the others involved.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle08.asp?xfile=data/theuae/2010/April/theuae_April368.xml§ion=theuae
Seek end to sex trafficking ads
BY CAMILLE BAUTISTA
Wednesday, April 14, 2010 2:20 PM EDT
Lured to the United States with the promise of a better life, many women find themselves exploited against their will instead.
To stop the abuse and exploitation, the Center for the Women of New York (CWNY) will ask local newspapers to remove the advertisements of businesses subtly involved in such perversions.
“The problem of sex trafficking is horrendous and we need to focus on what we as citizens – particularly women – can do,” said Ann Jawin, founder and chair of the CWNY. “You’re looking at your little league statistics and are a page away from these advertisements.”
An estimated 17,500 foreign nationals become victims of sex trafficking each year in the United States and another 244,000 U.S. citizens are exploited, according to a report by the National Human Trafficking Resource Center.
Queens has gained notoriety as a gateway for this exploitation due to its two international airports and its diversity of cultures.
At Borough Hall on Wednesday, April 7, Jawin explained that some community newspapers advertise massage parlors, escort services and spas, which at times have blatant messages. In other cases, women hired as waitresses, nannies and hotel workers end up abused, with their passports withheld.
The CWNY plans to send an informative letter to mainstream and ethnic newspaper publishers along with a request to sign a pledge to refuse ads in print and online that cater to the victimization or exploitation of women.
To report a suspected case or to provide information, call the Human Trafficking Resource Center at 888-373-7888 888-373-7888 or visit www.nhtrc.polarisproject.org.
Respectfully submitted from: http://www.queenscourier.com/articles/2010/04/14/news/top_stories/doc4bc60636ae2da016184733.txt
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