Hays High speaker: Human traffickers usually someone victims know

By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post

For many, sex trafficking seems like a far-away problem — something that happens in another country or a big city, but a Kansas advocate for trafficking victims says it happens in Kansas too.

Jennifer White, executive director of ICT SOS, talked to Hays High School students Monday about human trafficking as a part of a weeklong awareness campaign sponsored by the school’s DECA club.

ICT SOS was created in 2011 after two local high-profile sex trafficking cases were covered by local media. Victims in that case were close in age to White’s own daughter, who was 12 at the time.

“Reading that article and realizing that this kind of activity was happening not only in my community, but to kids that were the same age as my kid, was really what gave me what I call a gut-check moment,” she said.

The national average for children becoming victims of human trafficking is 12 to 14 years old. In Wichita, ICT SOS typically sees victims in the 14- to 17-year-old age range. Although most of the victims ICT SOS deals with are girls and women, men and boys are also trafficked. The rate of sexual violence among girls is one in four. For boys, it is one in six.

White said almost none of the cases of human trafficking ICT SOS deals with are kidnapping cases. Most of them involve a friend, boyfriend or family member.

“This is not a stranger-danger crime,” White said. “This is a situation where someone is building a relationship. They are gaining trust. It is a gradual thing. It is manipulating. It is talking someone into taking one step, and then the next step and then the next step.”

Predators often target youth who have difficultly feeling as if they belong. It may be a child who is in foster care or is experiencing abuse at home.

“We all want to belong to something — a sports team or choir or band or whatever that is — our family, our church,” White said. “There are so many people who don’t believe they belong anywhere, and that’s who traffickers prey on. They figure out what that vulnerability is for kids, and they try to be what the kid needs if that is a father figure, if that’s a boyfriend or girlfriend or a friend to listen to them.”

Almost every case ICT SOS now sees involves the internet. It might be recruiting on the front end with social media or advertising on the back end for prostitution.

“As sad and as sick as it is, you can order a person like you can order a pizza,” she said.

She urged the students if they receive a messages through Facebook from people they do not know to block and delete them. Law enforcement subpoenaed the social media records for one human trafficker and found records of 250 women and girls he was talking to on social media.

White said the relationship between a human trafficking victim and their pimp might be similar to a domestic violence situation.

“It’s that same kind of honeymoon phase,” White said. ” ‘Oh, I love you. You are the greatest thing in the world,’ and then it switches to, ‘You are so stupid. No one is ever going to want you. Do you know what you’ve done? No one is ever going to love you. But I love you, I think you are amazing.’ ”

Some youth may fear seeking help, because they are afraid they will be in trouble for what they have done.

In Kansas, minors involved in the sex trade, such as prostitution, stripping, escorting and pornography, are automatically considered victims because it is assumed they do not have the ability to consent, White said.

Kansas is considered a source state for human trafficking. Youth are recruited in places like Wichita, and traffickers use major highways like Interstate 135 or I-70 to move the youth to other states.

Trafficking is highly under-reported, so it is difficult to get solid statistics on its prevalence, White said. The number of cases in Wichita has been steadily increasing — 81 for 2016. These are only victims who are minors, and 2017 figures are not yet available. White said law enforcement believes the incidents of trafficking are not increasing, but awareness is resulting in more victims reporting it and getting help.

“It is a conversation we have to be having because it does happen here, and when we don’t talk about it, it lives in the secrets,” White said. “It is very important that we are talking about it and talking about it accurately.”

ICT SOS works to assist victims of human trafficking, but it also has a prevention effort that seeks to end human trafficking in Wichita and across Kansas.

“As community members, we feel if we can get out in front of it and we can stop it from happening to the kid, that is ultimately what is better,” White said. “It is great to have all those restoration pieces in place and being able to help someone on the back side of this, but if we can keep this from happening in the first place, we feel that is where we can have the greatest impact.”

White listed a number of ways youth and adults can help ICT SOS or help in their own communities.

ICT SOS takes a number of donations for its partner agencies that are used when agencies interact with trafficking victims or youth who are at risk of becoming trafficking victims. These include individually wrapped snack items, hygiene items and warm clothing like hoodies, sweat pants or socks.

“We had a girl come in the (homeless youth) drop-in center a couple of years ago who was about 14 or 15, and she was hanging around with a guy the staff knew to be a pimp in the area. They said, ‘You are a smart kid, why are you running around with this guy?’

“The thing for her that meant he loved her and he was going to take care of her and he was her protector was that he taught her to wash and condition her hair properly. … This girl had not had anyone who had invested enough in her to teach her how to take care of her hair, so those hygiene products coming form a safe place might have made a big difference.”

ICT SOS does Fresh Start Bags with hygiene items and clothing for abuse or neglect victims. White said children who law enforcement see now at 6, 7 or 8 are more likely to be victims of trafficking when they get older.

ICT SOS also has a program to help trafficking victims get tattoos removed or covered up. Often trafficked victims have tattoos of their pimp’s name, a gang name or symbol, or a street name. This can be dangerous for the victim and it is a constant reminder of a life they are trying to leave behind.

Besides donations to programs like ICT SOS, youth and adults can work in their own communities to help prevent human trafficking by serving as a mentor to younger children.

“Whether it is this issue or hunger or poverty or whatever,” White said, “it starts with caring about other people. So whatever that issue is for you, figure out what that is and figure out how you can help.”