This month I would like to share with you some information on Human Trafficking.

Human trafficking is modern-day slavery. It is the fastest-growing crime in the world, with the perpetrators making $32 billion a year buying and selling people for their profit and pleasure.

The United Nations definition of human trafficking is "The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation."

According to U.S. government estimates, thousands of men, women, and children are trafficked to the United States for the purposes of sexual and labor exploitation. An unknown number of U.S. citizens and legal residents are trafficked within the country primarily for sexual servitude and, to a lesser extent, forced labor. Trafficking can involve school-age children -- particularly those not living with their parents -- who are vulnerable to coerced labor exploitation, domestic servitude, or commercial sexual exploitation (i.e., prostitution). Sex traffickers target children because of their vulnerability and gullibility, as well as the market demand for young victims.

Those who recruit minors into prostitution violate federal anti-trafficking laws, even if there is no coercion or movement across state lines. The children at risk are not just high school students?studies demonstrate that pimps prey on victims as young as 12. Traffickers have been reported targeting their minor victims through telephone chat-lines, clubs, on the street, through friends, and at malls, as well as using girls to recruit other girls at schools and after-school programs.‪ (U.S. Dept of Education). The U.S. Department of Justice estimates 100,000 to 300,000 American kids under 18 are involved in prostitution and often targeted by sexual predators annually.  According to the FBI, the average age of a child sexually exploited is 11.  The average age of entry for a girl into prostitution is 13, for a boy 12.

Last month in collaboration with the Brooklyn District Attorneys Office we held an informative workshop on Human Trafficking. At The Healing Center we see the intersections between domestic violence and human traffking, having had a couple of our clients who came into this country with a promise of a job and who were coerce into trading sex  for wages.  It is an issue that's affecting children as young as 11 through 13.  The Healing Center has been invited to be a part of the Brooklyn Human Trafficking Task Force with the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office. 

There are many organizations doing wonderful work on this issue, Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, Freedom Network USA, the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking, the Women of the ELCA has a wonderful program, "Understanding and Responding to Human Trafficking." If you are interested in knowing more on this issue or would like to get involve contact me at 718-238-5138.

I ask for your continued prayers as we serve those who suffer in silence.

Antonia Clemente
Executive Director
 

The Heart of Bay Ridge

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Bethlehem Lutheran Church - Sunday Service: 10:30 am
Fourth & Ovington Avenues - 718-748-9502

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