U.S. Law Helps Victims of Human Trafficking

Jennifer Hile
for National Geographic Channel

July 13, 2004

The four teenage girls from Mexico were lured to the United States with
promises of work and a better life. But instead of living the American
dream, they lived a nightmare: Confined to a brothel in Plainfield, New
Jersey, the four were beaten and forced to work as prostitutes.

The girls' captivity ranged from 7 to 15 months. It ended in February 2002, when local police raided the brothel.

In May a federal court in New Jersey convicted the five men and women responsible for the girls' imprisonment. Their crime: human trafficking.

The presiding judge sentenced the five to between 3 and a half to 17 and a half years in prison. More important, according to some experts, the criminals were ordered to pay U.S. $135,240 in restitution to their victims.

"It is very important to have the assets of these traffickers confiscated and used to compensate the victims," Ann Jordan said. Jordan directs the Initiative Against Trafficking in Persons for Global Rights, a Washington, D.C.-based human rights advocacy group.

"A lot of traffickers will put up with prison if they know they will have several million dollars waiting for them when they get out," Jordan said. "Confiscating their assets is what really targets them."

Global Reach

Human trafficking is defined in legal terms as the recruitment, transport, or sale of people for the purpose of exploiting their labor.

The UN estimates that one to four million women and children worldwide are forced into prostitution and other forms of exploitation each year. Domestic service, agriculture, and factory work are other prime areas where trafficking is concentrated.

Nearly every country in the world serves as a country of origin, destination, or transit for labor exploitation. Yet in most places, dealing drugs carries stiffer penalties than human trafficking.

In the U.S. that reality is starting to change, thanks to a law known as the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act passed by Congress in December 2000.

Prior to the law's passage, "the U.S. was still using slavery statutes from the 1800s to deal with forced labor," Jean Bruggeman said. Bruggeman is a program manager for Boat People S.O.S., a Falls Church, Virginia-based nonprofit that works on refugee rights. "It was not legally possible to make traffickers pay restitution to their victims," she added.

The law mandates that victims be paid the gross income of the value of their labor during the length of their captivity.

Experts say the restitution provision does more than punish criminals.

"Many of the people who are trafficked are pushed into it by poverty," said Ashley Garrett, a program manager for countertrafficking at the International Organization for Migration in Washington, D.C. "So restitution is important to make sure [victims] don't fall back into the same dire financial straits that made them so vulnerable in the first place."

Since the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act's passage, the U.S. Justice Department has charged 140 people with the crime of human trafficking. The figure represents a threefold increase over the previous three years. Of the 140 accused, 92 have been convicted.

In each case, victims were granted special legal status through T visas, special visas that allow victims to remain in the U.S. for three years and receive the same benefits as refugees.

When victims' T visas expire, they can apply for permanent residency, according to Avaloy Lanning, a project coordinator for the New Jersey Anti-Trafficking Initiative, a program of the International Institute of New Jersey.

Garret, of the International Organization for Migration, says conferring special visa status ensures that trafficking victims are not simply classified as illegal immigrants and deported. "You don't want to treat a victim as a criminal," she said. "So from a human rights point of view, this is important."

Garret also notes the practice makes sense from a law-enforcement point of view. "If victims are deported, the police lose their best evidence against the traffickers," she said.

Enabling victims to remain in the U.S. helps ensure their safety, advocates say. They note that U.S.-based traffickers often have networks that extend back to their victims' countries of origin, leaving victims vulnerable to persecution should they return.

Human trafficking experts see the practice as a modern form of slavery. "It's not the traditional slavery that was supported by law and an overt part of international economies, like you saw in the past," said Jordan, of Global Rights. "But victims of trafficking have no control over their lives. They are held against their will and forced to work without pay. From their point of view, it's slavery."

Some observers say the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act and the increased prosecution of traffickers is slowly making inroads on human labor exploitation in the U.S.

Bruggeman, the Boat People S.O.S. refugee advocate, said, "It's important to raise consciousness generally about the issue among hospital workers, people at church, educators, police—any social service provider. So that when they run into potential victims, they have an awareness of the problem and how to deal with it."

For related coverage, watch Interpol Investigates Tuesday, July 13, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on the National Geographic Channel (U.S. only).

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