For many people, the phrase "human trafficking" conjures up images of horrific nightmares from long ago and far away. However, human trafficking is tragically still prominent, and remains a modern source of misery. President Barack Obama, in a speech to the 2012 Clinton Global Initiative, announced that America's fight against human trafficking is one of the great human rights causes of our time. It is a very real and very complicated 21st century problem, one that requires more attention than it receives.
Those who are aware of the practice often have various misconceptions regarding the practice of human trafficking. For example, those who are trapped in its vicious cycle are not just mail order brides from foreign countries. Shockingly, 83 percent of sex trafficking victims in the U.S. are American citizens. And while women constitute the overwhelming majority of victims, labor traffickers trap males as well, who are forced to work for little or no pay under terrible conditions in arrangements that vary between some form of indentured servitude and outright slavery.
This “worldwide business” bringing in $43 billion a year, has been a growing problem in the United States, particularly in Utah.
One of the largest human trafficking cases in U.S. history occurred between 2005 and 2007, when a group of workers from Thailand sought what they thought was freedom and a new life in America. At the center of scrutiny is Global Horizons, a Los Angeles-based company that recruited people in Thailand for farm work in the United States. It eventually placed some of them with two Utah companies: Circle Four pig farms in Milford and at Delta Eggs chicken farms in Delta. Conditions were barbaric. Members of the group stated that Global Horizons controlled their movements. If they failed to work long and hard, they were threatened that their families back home would lose everything. Housing lacked heat in freezing winters and air conditioning in scorching summers. They repeatedly went hungry and even had to trap birds and other animals for sustenance.
The workers stated they arrived legally in America at different times in 2004 and 2005 with H-2A visas for agricultural work. Such visas are good only as long as workers remain with the employer that obtained them, which in this case was Global Horizons—making these individuals literally trapped by their employers. If workers tried to leave Global, they would lose their legal status.
The Thais in Utah may be just the tip of the iceberg of human trafficking. Between 2001 and 2008, the Justice Department convicted 515 people on human trafficking charges. In 2012, it convicted another 47. How has Utah responded to such travesties?
Utah’s trafficking laws received a “D” grade in Shared Hope’s 2012 national report card, as did sixteen other states, including Maryland, New York, and Oregon. (Another 16 states scored an “F” grade, including Virginia, California, and the District of Columbia.) In 2006, the Department of Justice selected Salt Lake City as one of 40 cities to receive a grant to create a human trafficking task force, and there was a great deal of local publicity surrounding the issue. Sadly, that momentum seems to have faded. Though it appears that the Utah Human Trafficking Task Force remains in continuation, it has never published a report and it is unclear how active the task force remains. Though the task force is supposedly administered by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah, there is no mention of the task force on the U.S. Attorney’s Office website among its other projects.
Various advocacy groups suggest that a state-funded task force is essential to bring Utah in line with anti-trafficking goals, and to jumpstart Utah’s efforts to protect the vulnerable men women and children who are being exploited through sex and slave labor.
In March 2013, Utah made strides in combating human trafficking with a new bill. The Utah Senate voted 25-0 on to pass HB163 and it was signed into law on March 27th by Governor Gary Herbert. The law removes the statute of limitations on prosecuting suspects engaged in human trafficking, and bars the common defense claim that the age of a kidnapped person was not known to the suspects at the time of the crime. It also increases the penalties for felony convictions of using children in prostitution or smuggling children for the purpose of slavery or sexual exploitation.
However, there is a dire need for more action protecting those who are daily effected by exploitation. State and local governments need anti-trafficking coalition building, educational outreach, direct service to victims, and collaboration with other national and international organizations in the global fight against human trafficking.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's November/December 2013 print edition.
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Solutions to Human Trafficking: Exploring Local Alternatives
December 13, 2013
For many people, the phrase "human trafficking" conjures up images of horrific nightmares from long ago and far away. However, human trafficking is tragically still prominent, and remains a modern source of misery. President Barack Obama, in a speech to the 2012 Clinton Global Initiative, announced that America's fight against human trafficking is one of the great human rights causes of our time. It is a very real and very complicated 21st century problem, one that requires more attention than it receives.
Those who are aware of the practice often have various misconceptions regarding the practice of human trafficking. For example, those who are trapped in its vicious cycle are not just mail order brides from foreign countries. Shockingly, 83 percent of sex trafficking victims in the U.S. are American citizens. And while women constitute the overwhelming majority of victims, labor traffickers trap males as well, who are forced to work for little or no pay under terrible conditions in arrangements that vary between some form of indentured servitude and outright slavery.
This “worldwide business” bringing in $43 billion a year, has been a growing problem in the United States, particularly in Utah.
One of the largest human trafficking cases in U.S. history occurred between 2005 and 2007, when a group of workers from Thailand sought what they thought was freedom and a new life in America. At the center of scrutiny is Global Horizons, a Los Angeles-based company that recruited people in Thailand for farm work in the United States. It eventually placed some of them with two Utah companies: Circle Four pig farms in Milford and at Delta Eggs chicken farms in Delta. Conditions were barbaric. Members of the group stated that Global Horizons controlled their movements. If they failed to work long and hard, they were threatened that their families back home would lose everything. Housing lacked heat in freezing winters and air conditioning in scorching summers. They repeatedly went hungry and even had to trap birds and other animals for sustenance.
The workers stated they arrived legally in America at different times in 2004 and 2005 with H-2A visas for agricultural work. Such visas are good only as long as workers remain with the employer that obtained them, which in this case was Global Horizons—making these individuals literally trapped by their employers. If workers tried to leave Global, they would lose their legal status.
The Thais in Utah may be just the tip of the iceberg of human trafficking. Between 2001 and 2008, the Justice Department convicted 515 people on human trafficking charges. In 2012, it convicted another 47. How has Utah responded to such travesties?
Utah’s trafficking laws received a “D” grade in Shared Hope’s 2012 national report card, as did sixteen other states, including Maryland, New York, and Oregon. (Another 16 states scored an “F” grade, including Virginia, California, and the District of Columbia.) In 2006, the Department of Justice selected Salt Lake City as one of 40 cities to receive a grant to create a human trafficking task force, and there was a great deal of local publicity surrounding the issue. Sadly, that momentum seems to have faded. Though it appears that the Utah Human Trafficking Task Force remains in continuation, it has never published a report and it is unclear how active the task force remains. Though the task force is supposedly administered by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah, there is no mention of the task force on the U.S. Attorney’s Office website among its other projects.
Various advocacy groups suggest that a state-funded task force is essential to bring Utah in line with anti-trafficking goals, and to jumpstart Utah’s efforts to protect the vulnerable men women and children who are being exploited through sex and slave labor.
In March 2013, Utah made strides in combating human trafficking with a new bill. The Utah Senate voted 25-0 on to pass HB163 and it was signed into law on March 27th by Governor Gary Herbert. The law removes the statute of limitations on prosecuting suspects engaged in human trafficking, and bars the common defense claim that the age of a kidnapped person was not known to the suspects at the time of the crime. It also increases the penalties for felony convictions of using children in prostitution or smuggling children for the purpose of slavery or sexual exploitation.
However, there is a dire need for more action protecting those who are daily effected by exploitation. State and local governments need anti-trafficking coalition building, educational outreach, direct service to victims, and collaboration with other national and international organizations in the global fight against human trafficking.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's November/December 2013 print edition.
