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"THE DEFINITION OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING"
The Oxford American College Dictionary defines trafficking as "the transportation of goods or passengers; the action of dealing or trading in something illegal." Using this definition, human trafficking can be defined as the transportation of human beings as goods or the illegal dealing or trading of human beings.

Never before in the history of modern humanity have there been so many victims of slavery. The numbers are staggering. Today, there are estimated more than 27 million slaves worldwide; 230 million child laborers worldwide, and over 16 million child prostitutes worldwide. Millions more are enslaved within national borders. Anywhere from 2-4 million new trafficked victims are engulfed in this horror annually.
Of that, approximately 800,000 victims are trafficked across international boundaries Human trafficking is truly a world-wide phenomenon -- paradoxically hidden in the shadows and out in the open for all to see.

The following are just a few of the major funding sources for Terrorism.
#1. Weapon Sales
#2. Human Trafficking Sales
(They can sell a child, teenager or young girl over and over and over each day THIS EQUALS PROFIT)
# 3. Illegal Drugs Sales
(They can't sell the same drug over and over. Once it is used it is gone.) USA

Gang Relationship to Sex trafficking around the United States:

Gangs in New York, California, Virginia and other states in the United States kidnapped and enslaved girls between the ages of 11 and 14 for purposes of prostitution and trafficked them across state lines. The Commonwealth of Virginia has become the fastest growing area for gang and organized crime in the Nation
The greatest activity is between Richmond and Virginia corridor I-64.
Who are this Gangs / Organized crime:
MS-13, CRIPS, Chinese Mafia, Red Mafia "Russian" and Korean Mafia to include many other gangs? Jefferson Davis Parkway, Petersburg, Hopewell, and southern Richmond Sex Trafficking not prostitution but in slaved women and children.

The average age for Sex trafficked victims worldwide are between the age of 9 years old for girls and 12 years for boys. Young women are forced into the sex trade and believed they are coming to go to Universities for their education but instead they were forced into the escort service is the sex trade being raped over and over each day for the profit of organized crime and terrorist groups. One 20 year old girl from Russia was one of these victims thinking she was going to be going to a University in Virginia.

"The C.I.A. believes that 50,000 women and children are being trafficked into the United States annually." Children from Foster Care children have been thought to be runaway but instead had been manipulated via Internet or Kidnapped 147 rescued in Las Vegas from 27 states, their ages 12 – 16 years old being sold for $ 400.00 per 1/2 hour.

June 2007, Raids to brothels by the FBI and ICE Northern Virginia, Washington D.C. and Maryland. 127 of Asian and Hispanic children were under the age of 17 years rescued from brothels.

Short Pump Mall in Henrico County, the end of 2006 9 year old boy abducted and was rescued do to a person who caught the abduction on her cell phone and gave to Law Enforcement with license plate number.

Background

Estimated over $34 Billion each year in revenue and out of this stats say 80% comes from the sex trade. Research has shown that human trafficking enslaves nearly 4,000,000 women and children into the sex slave trade every year, in which near 1,000,000 American children in the United States alone between the ages of 12-17 have been victimized and trafficked across state lines to include Richmond, Virginia as a major hub. There have also been documented cases of babies as young as 6 months old being trafficked to use in pornographic videos per Paul and Lisa Program. It is often thought that human trafficking is mainly an international problem; however the statistics sadly show that the human trafficking industry is firmly rooted in the United States.

In general, Non-Profit groups have made valiant attempts to handle problems relating to domestic violence abuse, by making available call centers or safe houses for these victims. However due to the growing problem of human trafficking here in the Richmond and surrounding counties, these types of places are not set up to handle victims of human trafficking. Catholic Refuge and Immigration here in Richmond and immigration services have provided some relief to these victims, however it has been proved that these organizations cannot handle the sheer volume of victims and the unique issues that plague these victims upon their escape from their captors. One of our goals is to set up a call center for victims. We already have folks that speak fluent Spanish, Russian, and Chinese that have been trained to handle these calls.

From fiscal year 2001 through fiscal year 2005, the Civil Rights Division and United States Attorney's Offices filed 91 trafficking cases, a 405% increase over the number of trafficking cases filed from fiscal years 1996 through 2000. In these cases, Department attorneys charged 248 trafficking defendants, a 210% increase over the previous five fiscal years. In addition, 140 defendants of trafficking related crimes were convicted, a 109% increase over the previous five years.

As you can see that there has been a greater number that has risen in the past two years. Read this statement from 2006, Despite an estimated prevalence of 100,000 to 150,000 slaves in the U.S., fewer than 1,000 victims have been assisted through the efforts of federal, state, and local law enforcement since 2001, when services for trafficking victims were first made available. U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division. (2006, February).

Information on Sex Trafficking

"Sexual Trafficking is the recruitment, transportation (within national or across international borders),transfer, harboring, or receipt of persons for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation. Sexual trafficking is accomplished by means of fraud, deception, threat of or use of force, abuse of a position of vulnerability, and other forms of coercion.

Trafficking of persons exists in two distinct types: labor trafficking and sexual trafficking. "This new distinction avoids the problem of combining into a single category both labor violations and violations that are more akin to a forcible sexual assault." U.N. Definition: (from Protocol to Prevent Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Person, Especially Women and Children, Supplementing the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime)

(a) "Trafficking in persons" shall mean the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring 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.

Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery of practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs;
(b) The consent of a victim of trafficking in persons to the intended exploitation set forth in subparagraph (a) of this article shall be irrelevant where any of the means set forth in subparagraph (a) have been used;
(c) The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of a child for the purpose of exploitation shall be considered "trafficking in persons" even if this does not involve any of the means set forth in subparagraph (a) of this article;
(d) "Child" shall mean any person under eighteen years of age.

Scope of the Problem:
Worldwide, it is estimated that somewhere between 800,000 and four million women, children and men are trafficked each year, and no region is unaffected.

Results

ICE arrested more than 10,000 illegal alien child predators nationwide in its first four years. The targets include U.S. citizens and non-citizens. ICE has arrested individuals who have committed a wide range of child sex exploitation crimes.

Non-Citizen Child Predators

More than 85% of the arrests made as part of Operation Predator have been arrests of non-citizen sex offenders whose crimes make them removable from the United States . To date, more than 5,500 of them have been deported. These predators have included New Jersey , New York and California men who repeatedly molested their own daughters as well as an Austrian-national soccer coach convicted of fondling a mentally impaired minor.

Child Sex Tourists

Working cooperatively with foreign governments through ICE attach offices worldwide, ICE agents have made more than 61 arrests under the child sex tourism provisions of the PROTECT Act. For example, on February 21, 2007, Steven Eric Prowler pleaded guilty to federal charges of traveling abroad with the intent to have sex with a minor and to engaging in illicit sexual conduct with minors in another country. Prowler was deported from Thailand after serving one year in a Thai prison for sexual encounters with approximately 100 underage Thai boys. Thai officials and ICE agents investigated the case and discovered detailed journals kept by Prowler of his sexual encounters with underage boys in Thailand , Cambodia and Mexico . Prowler awaits sentencing and faces up to 60 years in federal prison.

Human Smuggling & Trafficking of Children

The criminal networks engaged in human smuggling and trafficking have become more violent and profit-driven than ever before. In one case, a predator tried to purchase 9 to 11-year-old girls from Mexico . ICE agents arrested the individual when he traveled to Arizona to have sex with the girls. In another case, ICE agents working undercover on the Internet encountered a Texas predator negotiating for a child online. His arrest led them to two other suspected predators.