Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking of Youth Response Training (Part 1)
This course was made by a survivor, and she teaches it once a month. She said if we want to go down any rabbit holes, its more than welcome.
A minor is someone under the age of 18.
She asked which things have value, some said shelter. Access to medical care. I said money, power, youth, and beauty. She said some of those aren’t so tangible. How do you get beauty and youth? I said adrenochrome, but probably we won’t get into that. She agreed we won’t get into that.
A woman who works in a detention center smiled at my comment
Sex trafficking is the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, obtaining, soliciting, or patronizing of a commercial sex act. Induced by force, fraud, or coercion.
The person who is looking to purchase commercial sex is called “a john”- we’ll call them a buyer of commercial sex
BTW: I met someone whose dad dropped her off on Aurora avenue (a bad reputation street here) and she said her dad just left her there cause he was sick of her and he sold her off to become a prostitute. Now she’s older and becoming a teacher. And escaped that life.
If a 40yo soccer coach is having a relationship with a 13yo. They get caught, and the 13yo defends the relationship. Has the crime occurred? The kid can’t consent even though they think they love him.
What if the coach is paying the kid $50 per sex act and the kid needs the money? Well, back in 2016, it was a minor misdemeanor. Less trouble than paying a 13-year-old to rape them than if he’d stolen a Snickers bar on the way home. Instead of the 13yo as a victim, they were a perpetrator. We’d arrest the 13yo. Brought them to detention, detained them, and charge them with prostitution.
That’s how they did business. In one scenario, the 13yo was the victim. The other was the perpetrator.
A 40yo is with a 16 year old or older, no commercial involvement it’s legal…???? But if money is involved its illegal.
I spoke up and said, “wait, what?” but then she said she’ll explain it all.
If you’re under 18, you can not consent to commercial sex. We have “full safe harbor” in WA state. If you’re under 18, you can not be charged with prostitution. It’s not a thing for you. If you are 18 and older and you do engage and receive sometihng of value to get sex, you can be charged with prostitution.
If you are 18-147, you CAN be charged with selling sex/access to your own body. That is a simple misdemenour. Over 18, you can still be charged. We’re not really charging anyone, but you could be.
but 16 + 60 is legal. okay?
There’s a woman in jail now who killed her trafficker, but
So it gets dicy when trying to figure out the difference between grooming and giving gifts when someone wants to exploit someone. But it’s only trafficking when the gift is for the exchange of sex trafficking.
Young people, it’s not illegal for them to be out on the streets. We have traffickers bringing young people in and having them walk the streets.
On average, traffickers make 2-7k per night per person on Aurora Avenue.
A lot of the time, there are no places to go to help the kids and take them. You can’t arrest them for standing on the streets.
If a young person is being trafficked, that’s child abuse.
If parents remove the child and facilitate the moving of the young person, its reason to arrest.
For the first time ever, in Washington state, we now have to screen for the issue. We don’t have a good data set cause we’ve never been required to collect data. But now, we have to screen for trafficking since June of last year.
Child welfare only has to screen if a call into CPSS alleges child sex trafficking. But now it’s whenever there is reasonable cause to believe.
Finally, they’re creating a dataset of children experiencing this.
I told her: yeah, (the girl i met who was sold to aurora avenue) said that as a kid she was always put into hospitals and correction facilities so her parents didn’t have to take care of her (and it was all paid for by the state) and then she’d just be medicated all day long, spend weeks/months there… and then eventually dold off to be a prostitute. So I’m glad to hear there’s data being collected. Find trends and step in.
She said it’s great, I said this, it all fits in, and we’ll get into it. It fits in perfectly.
19-40^ of homeless youth experience sex and/or labor trafficking, equating to about 800,000 youth and young adults annually.
More than 23,500 runaways in 2018, 1 in 7 were victims of child sex trafficking
I added that 2,300 kids per day go missing, and 90% run away from home.
I told them I want to tell them when I talked to our old mayor about this when there’s time.
Now there’s a movie about Foster Homes.
The majority of girls come out of foster care and end up meeting a guy like she did (the foster care mom)
Another woman: by 10.5 years old, a dad who did domestic violence. Stayed at a local crack house, took her brother and sister, just left her daughter behind.
put you in a home, call them your foster parents. But they can’t make decisions if you can go hang out with a friend after school. They can’t make any decisions
In the group home, it’s scary. Wanted to call her cousin, but you’re not allowed to call or talk to anyone. So she ran away to her cousin’s house.
They get moved around so much, from group home to group home. Foster home to foster home. Don’t feel they have a family or home.
So a guy comes along and offers a family/home, so they go to him.
Prostitution started when she was 12.
They look for vulnerable foster kids. Pimps hang out at the group homes. They know where the vulnerable are. It’s the story of the foster girls they know.
The best thing that they can provide is stability. Just having a consistent safe place to go to, a safe person to contact, a person to go to or talk to it’s really big.
The kids in foster programs have fallen through every crack in our system and are trying to find some sense of control.
You can watch more at TheLifeStory.org
But all of the survivors featured are female-identified. No male stories in these videos. Want to call that out, because it’s important we talk about all aspects. Boys are trafficked too.
We want people to imagine any/all children. Kids can be trafficked from any community, race, gender, economic class, education level, or sexual orientation.
Higher numbers of victims in marginalized communities.
If you tell a kid they can stay in your house in exchange for sex, that is trafficking.
Historically, young people who have been preyed upon have not been believed. They’re targeted because people don’t believe them.
Now we’re going to talk about language, watch a video, process the video, then take a break.
We have to get people to care about it. Language is one of the first ways to get people to care. Our language matters.
Gary Widgeway was a serial killer of sex workers. He is currently serving 49 life sentences. He killed more people than that. 20 were children, at least.
He’s the largest serial killer of children that we know of in our country.
33 were under 20.
But many people don’t care. Many adults don’t care. So much of her job is to get people to care.
I’m like wtf, how do people not care?
It’s what people find scary. Some people on the board were so uncomfortable, didn’t know how to engage with trafficked youth.
It’s a scary kind of issue. Also, its one of those - if it’s not affecting you directly, how do you care? Get involved? make a difference?
So many people are busy living their lives
It’s hard to identify kids abused, but it’s easier to identify buyers. They’re open in internet forums. They communicate.
Let’s talk about buyers.
The police department posted an ad online, “I’m 15, wanna pay me for sex?”
The ad got taken down in less than 2 hours
Normally its coded, it's coded. Give me 50 roses for an hour of my time
How many individuals clicked and contacted them?
OVER 200!!!
But then they worried if they kicked the buyers out, they’d go to smaller communities.
So another small town did an ad- pick me up after freshman track practice at the high school.
They’ll catch these dudes. It’ll all be city folk coming north, because Seattle is cracking down.
but who was it? city or local?
local. over 100…
OMG, IT’S AN ISSUE EVERWHERE.
Buyers of children are more likely to be white. More likely to make 100k or more. More likely to have advanced degrees.
WHITE PROFESSIONAL SUPER EDUCATED INDIVIDUALS. :( omg.
Buyers are at larger tables when you have rich white men at a table.
We have to, in order to end trafficking, we need to have a true culture change. where it’s not acceptable to buy access to kids. to convince people not to buy children.
MAPS groups = want more socially acceptable to be attracted to minors
HORRIBLE
Struggling with the trafficking of minors. When will we worry about protecting kids more than our own feelings about things? When we talk about kids of color or LGBT, its because they face more issues at home and within their communities. More vulnerable to be on the streets and exploited.
streets are better, then more vulnerable.
If your choice is starving or saying “okay,” you say okay.
One of the things we know working in juvenile justice, kids often get adultified. “Well, she chose to do this.” - No, she is 12. She didn’t choose for this to happen. Push back.
But kids like to say, “they’re working/dating,” not that they’re being trafficked.
This next video is about a documentary from the 80s. It looked at young kids living on the streets. Then, in the early 90s, I got a kid to be interviewed for Dateline 10 years later. So it’s a Dateline special looking back at the documentary. This is from 93, 94. Listen to the language they use.
She wants a better life than this (she said)
They can never take her scars away.
Children are on the street, hustling, selling themselves for money
The number of children running away from homes is in the millions.
Every once in a while, you catch a glimpse. on the street, in a photo, on TV.
Rarely track them into adulthood. Kids move around or die. But 10 years ago, a photographer took an assignment and befriended one child in particular. She left home at 13 and had two arrests for prostitution by 14. Brought her in for an interview. This is not someone you’re going to forget.
Picked Seattle back then because it was “the most livable city”. It’d be a surprise. On Pike Street, many kids hung out, all had street names. Paddy, munchkin, lulul, wrath, and tiny.
Tiny used to turn dates lots and lots. Pulling day and night. So no longer pulls dates she doesn’t know.
All she wanted at age 14 was a stuffed horse. She was still such a baby.
For Halloween, she wanted to dress up as a Parisian prostitute. For prostitutes, you want them to have the persona of a movie star.
Her real dad she never knew. He could be rich or a bum, I don’t know. I really want to meet him. For all I know, he could be one of these dates.
It’s very strange that men like little girls. They’re perverts. I like the money, I don’t like them.
After we reflected, I said they glamorized her a lot and didn’t show respect. It was emotional (and i even cried) and had her hug the stuffed animal. And made it seem like her fault.
They called her a prostitute, a drug addict, not seen as a victim at all.
She’s a trafficking victim. They made her look stupid.
engaging in a lot of sexual activity, and their education comes from buyers, porn, and nothing.
ugh, this is upsetting me. :(
She’s only ever had her period two times. These are kids. They’re in these circumstances because of other people’s actions.
Now it’s time to take a break. I have another event a bit after noon, I’ll go attend, I’ll leave in an hour. Then I have 4 more interviews + tutoring + another event tonight, haha. Omg. Busy day. I’ll pack up my stuff a bit for today and then log back in for one hour.
Actually - I think I want to head downtown. This event has me like, idk. Wanting to move a bit, you know, get walking. Its pretty upsetting and makes me want to not sit still. So I’ll head to the lite rail and join from my phone + take notes back when i get on the bus/literail. Though I may walk to the literail which will take 20 min. Anyway, that will be the reason for my pause in notes if i miss a few things.
They have the knowledge of how much money they can make. No way for a young person to make 2-7k/night. So the alternatives are rough.
A couple great orgs. Best alliance has safe jobs. Partner with businesses ending slakvety and trafficking.
Interview and hire at risk individuals. Corporate to ups warehouse. The whole spectrum
Economic alternatives.
Sometimes you don’t care who is in the room. Just get to what you need to know? No. It does matter who is in the room. Theborooke you need to work with on cases.
These kids show up in the system with mental health and big problems. One thing working well is trafficking issues are being incorporated into child advocacy centers.
Team of healthcare forensic interviewing. All the healthcare they need. Share story of child abuse and neglect.
Mangus mountain. Pearl haven.
But that’s about it.
Most kids take off and run away.
Always a wait list but kids run away.
We don’t have beds or detox
Raped daily. On drugs. Living in encampment. But kids are scared.
We don’t have services. It should be hard but not impossible to get young people treatment in Washington state.
Is data getting better? It’s really hard to get people to care when we have a very obvious with the Epstein files, evidence of trafficking. In our country nothing happening. It’s hard to say we care when people doing harm get off and people who have been harmed get nothing.
We lose a lot of funding when we have a hard time filing positions.
A lot of agencies don’t accept state insurance or can’t facilitate the level of care recommendation.
It’s not that things are getting better, but there’s no detox. A youth can’t be in the bed unless they’ve been sober three days. Youth can’t just stop cold turkey to get to a treatment facility. So many reasons.
The clients had to do sober support groups, go to job, school, court appointments- and realized that this is so much to do. All while dealing with addiction. The hoops we make them jump through are overly hard.
She wrote a proposal for mental illness drug dependency funding. Pay advocates $30/hr minimum. Relationship is the intervention of people make a living wage. Can hire easier.
- good argument but for the same amount of money we can get two advocates at $15/hr. Zero advocates.
In Seattle, our minimum wage is tha you could make more money as a busser or bartender. We need to pay more.
She feels like a broken record all the time. Need to pay a living wage and find services available.
She feels we don’t care about children and families in Washington state
90% of services were committing fraud.
We need to invest in the longterm. Not just short term care at a library or community safe space. But it’s generational and it’ll take a decade or more to see results.
Most people think pimps and third parties control trafficking. Actually, she doesn’t like to use the word “pimp” because there are lots of inaccurate connotations against them Jeffery and he’s lane are two of the biggest pimps lately.
Some families grow up this way they’re raised to be in the trafficking industry. It’s within the family and expected and normalized.
Parents would photograph and video buyers with their kids. Then mutually assured destruction. Horrible!!! Finally this girl is saying what’s happening. Injuries didn’t show at the pediatrician. Police filed nothing. Or were the pediatricians and police chief her traffickers? They were.
Male survivor was a prominent position traded him to members of the country club. If a young person comes and says this, come from a point of belief and then verify.
Start from the place of belief. Assume it’s true. Then verify. So much exploitation.
One girl reported school was her safe place. Away from traffickers. Stopped when she went through puberty. That’s when she started acting out in school. No trafficking now. Pay attention. To this.
Creation of images of CSA. Child plrnography isn’t a thing. It’s child dexual sssualt.
Creation of images is part of the trafficking for family assault victims.
All real. Found out about trafficking because of HSI. Images of the young person on computers in Australia. Happening in the home with families. We have to be paying attention.
Survival sex. But we want to change the name to buyer facilities trafficking. And the buyers give what they need to survive.
Young kids leave their unsafe home or kicked out, they do what they need to do. They are still a victim of trafficking.
An independent sec victim gets to keep all the funds. But everything and take care of themselves.
The amount of trauma these kids see, murders, assault… we have survived when they’re ready.
After new rules on pornhub to guarantee no underage or non consensual events, over 70% taken down. But days later things reloaded cause they’d been downloaded
The most vulnerable place for kids to be attacked are their bedroom. Their cell phones. That’s access. No or should have access.
It’s complicated and so much bigger than the pimp controlled girl narrative tha we seen on tv.
All these types can happen. Often times young people experience multiple types of trafficking in their life.
Be a safe compassionate adult.
The recruitment process, we’ll watch a video to start. A survivor of Gems. They have a documentary. It’s a pimp trafficking controlled scenario.
You think other people don’t have secret as bad as you but they don’t have time to listen or hear you. You see girls on videos. So your way to escape is to think wha it must be like. You know adult men look at you so you wonder how you can use that.
One day out of school a guy in a Cadillac is nice looking. Tells you you look pretty. It’s been a while since anyone noticed you. So for the first time you feel someone is interested in you. He says he can be a daddy to you.
- that night he takes you to a club, gives you drinks, you get a few dollars. You keep looking at his face and you’re scared but he encourages you. Then that night he tells you there’s more to do. He tells you to strip and you think you’d never knew what to do but your stepfather has been doing this to you. So you knew how. A part of you died.
Then he takes you to McDonald’s and tells you you did a good job and you feel happy
You don’t realize what it’s gonna be like to be on the trap and get rapped. To hav a gun to your had. To be best for not making enough money. To offer cops to have ssex instead of being arrested. When your bail won’t be paid even though you made your pimp a few thousand.
One girl shares that a 27 year old man who worked at Dairy Queen with his daughters would walk them home. He worked with them.
Her daughters worked there. Why’s it so hard to believe someone can just accept me for who I am? This man is grooomjng you. He’d ask to borrow money and then pay her back. Larger money Escalating into a grooming situation. She made the man’s lie a living hell wet she’s thankful. Kids get wrapped upesinnovent.
He Was doing this wit a lot of young girls working there it’s terrible.
Getting invited to a petty and before you know it at one of these houses. It’s that easy.
They target girls with low self esteem. Girls who are ignored. Find the unmet need in young persons life. Connection, belonging, family. Then become that unmet need and manipulate the kid.
Kids can get tricked. You don’t have to kudnap anyone. You just haven’t met their unmet need.
It’s really fun until it’s not and then. You’re stuck.
And our job is to be the safe adult the young person can con to and not freak out or punish. But be here for them bf what they need. How do we help? What do we do?
Tomorrow we all looking at indicators and behaviors fr recruiting.
What do we do? How do we engage, be the safe compassionate nonjudgmental adult
