Eighty people have been arrested by the FBI and police in the Cleveland area. All those arrested were involved in prostitution, and Cleveland is in the process of tracking all individuals who are in any way involved in the trafficking of children. Special agent, Scott Wilson, says that in nearby Toledo sixty children have been rescued out of trafficking recently. The girls that are found in these horrible conditions can be as young as twelve, and are usually picked up by pimps at a vulnerable time in their lives. According to Wilson, some of the girls have been disowned by their family or have fallen through the cracks socially. Pimps are trained to gain the trust of the emotionally needy young girls and then betray them for personal gain. The girls may eventually be reported as missing, but have often been transported to different states by that time and have been forced into prostitution. According to this article,36 of the people arrested were prostitutes, while 44 were johns who had bought their services.
Although this article is about Cleveland, it’s referring to a much bigger global problem. I’ve written a lot about human trafficking in other countries, but I also felt it was important to mention what a dilemma it is here in our very own nation. This article makes me cringe. I’m glad that awareness is being heightened in Cleveland, but am not naïve enough to think that it’s a complete solution. It concerns me that the prostitutes are being arrested only because if this were to happen in cases of human trafficking, it would be completely unjust. It would also be a deterrence for victims of human trafficking to report it to the authorities if they were afraid of being arrested for prostitution. Anyways, my only hope is that justice is done to all those involved in such a horrible practice.
http://www.latimes.com/wjw-news-prostitution-human-trafficking-cleveland,0,3342917.story
5 comments:
As we have talked much about human trafficking in my SOC 323 class I was not aware that it was happening so much in the United States. It seems that socially as a society we look upon these issues internationally and think it could never happen to people so young in the United States yet it's so prevalent. It worries me because the ages are so very young and it also brings about the issue of how in the heck is it happening. How has it continued for so long. How many foreigners have been subjected to this type of thing in the United States. It's so sad because I have read about this in Ital, Africa, Russia yet I need to look at the United States as well.
I agree with Makedatiye, I was also not aware that human trafficking was something that was happening so close to where we are. I always think about human trafficking as being an international problem. I think that in the United States we just look past issues like this, and look toward issues that are 'more important' and issues like this are often missed when they are actually more serious sometimes. The fact that this is effecting girls that are so young in age is such a problem, how are these girls getting put into this situation at such a young age? When no girl should have to be put into this social problem situation.
Human trafficking is clearly becoming more and more popular not only in other countries but now in the U.S. I would have never thought that this would be so close to home. I was very surprised and shocked that this is being done in a country where safety and the well-being of the Americans is a priority.
I think it is important for our country to speak out on the serious issue of human trafficking. When people think of human trafficking they probably picture these events taking place in developing countries. Our country should be more focus in the human trafficking that is happening within our our neighborhood, and try to stop it from having to our fellow Americans. People need to be informed of what is happening in their own country as well as other parts of the world. Certain issues should not be kept out of the public eye, because a change will never be able to happen.
Human trafficking is a difficult issue to address and it occurs in more than just impoverished nations. Victims are often isolated due to lingual and cultural barriers as well as lacking in legal knowledge of protections and agencies that would assist. It would be interesting to see how this case is prosecuted, if the victims are given Visas or if they're deported and how the traffickers will be punished. Knowing how the authorities discovered this instance of human trafficking in the US would also be good to include, as it might inform the public and increase public approval of additional protections for victims.
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