By host on 5/10/2010 1:32 PM

By host on 5/8/2010 10:26 AM

The United Nations special rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, especially women and children, Joy Ngozi Ezeilo, has commended the Egyptian Government for accelerating its efforts in the fight against trafficking in persons.
The Special Rapporteur identified common forms of trafficking in persons in Egypt to include trafficking for the purposes of sexual exploitation of under aged girls through “seasonal / temporary” marriage, child labour, domestic servitude, other forms of sexual exploitation and prostitution.

She also stated that there are indications that trafficking for forced marriages, forced labour, transplantation of human organs and body tissues may be much more than current estimates, adding that the incidence of internal trafficking is much higher than transnational trafficking and the prevalence of street children increases their vulnerability to child trafficking.

To read the full article, Read More »

By host on 5/7/2010 9:24 AM

Yes, she stripped and yes she gave all of her money to Marlo Williams.

This much, Crown and defence agreed on Thursday.

If Justice Anne-Marie Hourigan believes defence lawyer Peter Thorning, she believes that the 19-year-old woman handed hundreds of dollars over to Williams, 24, of her own free will and that she could have left him any time she wished.

Such a notion, that the Alberta woman was “exercising free will” and that Williams was the “unbelievably lucky beneficiary” to her situation, “seems ludicrous,” Crown attorney Michael Demczur said during Williams’ sentencing hearing in Newmarket.

“There is coercion between these individuals. There is exploitation,” Demczur said. “This is a human trafficking situation.”

Though the first person to be charged with human trafficking by York Regional Police, the charge didn’t make its way into Williams’ guilty plea earlier this year.

< ... Read More »

By host on 5/3/2010 1:52 PM

Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof told a story yesterday afternoon to a packed audience in Statler Hall about two 15-year-old Cambodian girls trapped in the despairing shackles of prostitution. He had spoken to both of them for an article he was working on as a reporter and was struck by the fact that after his article ran, they would return to their lives of physical and emotional abuse.

“I had a great front page story and these girls were going to stay behind and die of AIDS,” he said

Read More »

By host on 4/30/2010 12:24 PM

Kathmandu, Nepal (CNN) -- Geeta was 9 when she began wearing makeup, staying up until 2 a.m. and having sex with as many as 60 men a day.

"I used to be really sad and frustrated with what was happening in my life," she said.

The daughter of Nepalese peasant farmers, Geeta -- now 26 -- had been sold to a brothel in India by a member of her extended family. The family member had duped Geeta's visually impaired mother into believing her daughter would get work at a clothing company in Nepal.

"The brothel where I was ... there [were] many customers coming in every day. The owner used to verbally abuse us, and if we didn't comply, [she] would start beating us with wires, rods and hot spoons."

It was not until Geeta was 14 that a police officer rescued her and brought her to a safe house compound run by Anuradha Koirala. The 61-year-old woman and her group, Maiti Nepa ... Read More »

By host on 4/29/2010 4:10 PM

KOTA KINABALU: Sabah police have admitted that the state is now a hotspot for human trafficking in the country.

Apart from the difficulty in preventing crimes due to the state's weak border control, providing shelter and protection to victims who escape the trade has also become a major concern.

Head of the anti-gambling, gangsterism and prostitution unit at the Sabah police headquarters, DSP Mohd Taufik Maidin, said police are finding it hard to shelter the victims while waiting for their cases to be brought up in court.

Taufik said Sabah is considered one of the three top destinations for human traffickers in the country and several syndicates had been crippled between last year and March this year.

He said 23 pimps, including seven women, were arrested for luring women into the sex trade.

He added that 35 women, mostly foreigners from a neighbouring country, were arrested in three raids at ... Read More »

By host on 4/12/2010 12:49 PM

The Iowa Court of Appeals recently denied the appeal of Leonard Russell.

Russell was sentenced to 25 years in prison in 2008 after being convicted of ongoing criminal conduct, human trafficking and pandering. It was the first conviction under Iowa’s human trafficking law, which went into effect in 2006.

Russell was accused of forcing two Nebraska teens into prostitution after meeting them at an Omaha hotel in August 2007. The two girls, then ages 15 and 16, had run away from a group home in Fremont, Neb.

The 15-year-old was found in Washington, D.C. She had been sent there on a Greyhound bus by Russell, who told her she was going to work as a prostitute and live with his cousin, according to court documents.

Anderson, sexual abuse advocate and public educator for the Catholic Charities Phoenix House, Read More »

By host on 4/9/2010 10:24 AM

-A few weeks ago, I picked up the Saturday edition of Punch which I spotted laying around my house. There was something about this paper that struck a chord, there was an article titled “I slept with an average of 7 men a day”. I was taken aback by the headline. I read the article and it was both heartbreaking and infuriating.

The subject of the article was a teenager named Agatha, who was lured away from her village in Enugu by a family friend who promised her a job as salesgirl in Ibadan. She ran away from home despite pleas from her grandmother. As soon as she landed in Ibadan, she was handed over to her new ‘owner’. I say owner because she was sold. She was taken to a dingy hotel, starved for 3 days and despite her pleas, she was threatened with violence. After that point, her life as a sex slave began. Being abused by various men everyday with her ‘pay’ being pocketed by her ‘owner’, ironically named Madam Best. Agatha was very lucky, a would-be customer helped ... Read More »

By host on 4/6/2010 9:21 AM

To Brianna, a sweet-faced honor student and athlete, it started as a lark: A spur-of-the-moment drive to Seattle in December to party with two college-age guys she barely knew.

"They were very well-dressed. They had diamond jewelry and multiple cellphones. They were driving a Mercedes," she recalled.

They told her she was "better than this small town."

Brianna took her dad's car and drove to Seattle for the day, telling her parents she was hanging out with friends. Once she arrived, her new friends persuaded her to stay overnight at their house and offered her a bedroom. They persuaded her to strip in a club and give most of the money to the them" Just give it to us. We'll take care of you". They wanted her to come to Phoenix with them, so she could make lots of money.

Three days passed. Brianna's cellphone was dying, and she didn't have her charger.

She knew she wa ... Read More »

By host on 4/4/2010 9:25 PM

A Gaithersburg man accused of coercing minors to have sex for money, drugging them and threatening them with firearms, could spend the rest of his life in prison after being convicted by a federal jury March 24.

Between April and May of 2007, Lloyd Mack Royal, 29, drove underage girls to hotels in Gaithersburg and Washington, D.C. to have sex with paying clients, Marcia Murphy, spokeswoman for the United States Attorney for the District of Maryland, said last week.

During his two week trial, witnesses testified that Royal and his two co-defendants – who both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit sex trafficking— gave the girls cocaine, cigarettes dipped in PCP, alcohol and marijuana before getting them to have sex with customers.

To read the full story, click here.

 

By host on 4/1/2010 10:36 AM

"Alexandre was 15 when a man offered to take him to his hotel after a party at a Dubai club. The young French-Swiss boy accepted.

When he got in the car, however, Alexandre was surprised to see another two men inside. The three men took Alexandre to the desert, locked him inside the vehicle and each of them raped him, threatening him with a knife to force him to submit to the abuse.

But Alexandre’s nightmare was only just beginning. When the men pushed him out of the car at the entrance of a hotel and the teenager went to police to report the rape, the police physician who examined him said he found no signs of sexual violence.

He said he could only identify indications of consensual sex and of previous homosexual activity.

The medical examination not only eliminated the crime and the search for the culprits, it also turned Al ... Read More »

By host on 2/16/2010 4:36 PM

We recently worked with a reporter in Belgium who went to Dubai to investigate reports that human trafficking was happening around the five star hotels in the city. The journalist returned with many stories of what seemed like forced prostitution. Below is the extract about Hyatt Regency Dubai, which we have translated into English.

“About 24 hours later we arrive in The Premiere, the huge nightclub from the Hyatt Regency Hotel, one of the biggest and best-known business hotels in Dubai. Entrance costs are 125 dirham a person, almost 25 Euros. The club is crowded, even though it is only 11 o'clock. Hundreds of prostitutes are positioned around the dance floor, or hang a Read More »

By host on 2/4/2010 10:35 AM

The government in the Philippines as stopped giving visas to women who want to work in South Korean bars near to American military bases. Reports that many of the women are forced into prostitution if they cannot sell enough drinks have lead to this renewed crack-down. It is reported, however, that women from Russia and other countries are quickly filling the gap. To read more about this story, please click here.

By host on 2/3/2010 11:19 AM

Police in the UAE Emirate of Ras Al Khaimah have arrested eight men who allegedly ran a human trafficking ring. The trafficking activity was discovered when a 20 year old woman who had arrived for domestic work was kidnapped and raped. One of her attackers left his mobile phone in the apartment where the woman was being held and she managed to phone her family who contacted the police. To read more about this case, please click here.

By host on 2/2/2010 12:51 PM

Police in Mexico City have arrested 26 suspects on charges of trafficking and prostituting women against their will. It is alleged that they forced 28 women into prostitution in hotels and parking lots. To read more about this, please click here.

By host on 1/28/2010 2:25 PM

Two trafficked girls aged 10 and 14 have been rescued in Cambodia, when a motocycle driver offered to arrange girls for the director of operations of the Australian anti-trafficking organisation The Grey Man. The man was taken to a hotel and showed the two young Vietnamese girls. The police were then contacted and working with International Justice Mission, the girls were rescued. To read more about this subject, please click here.

By host on 1/22/2010 10:46 AM

Two workers in a hotel in the Muraqqabat area of Dubai are accused of forcing dancers in the hotel night club to have sex with clients. One of the accused was in charge of bringing the women from India and had oversight of them in the hotel. The second defendent is a waiter at the hotel who is accused of driving the women to clients. The case continues. For more information, please click here.

By host on 1/5/2010 10:35 AM

Three Oregan residents have been charged with sex trafficking of a minor and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of minors. The police believe that they took pictures of the underage girls and posted them on the internet before renting local hotel rooms and forcing them to have sex with clients.To read more about this incident, please click here.

By host on 12/23/2009 10:33 AM

Police have arrested Ravinder Kaur for allegedly running a brothel inside the Abhishek Hotel in the Kahnpur area of Ahmedabad. It is alleged that Ravinder brought girls to the hotel from outside the state to engage them in prostitution. Ravinder Kaur has been charged under the Immoral Trafficking Act. To read more about this, please click here.

By host on 12/11/2009 8:41 AM

Police have arrested Shankar Kumar Mishra, the manager of Delhi's Dreamland Hotel, along with a Russian woman allegedly being forced to prostitute herself, after a raid in Rajkot. Investigations are ongoing, but both have been charged under the Immoral Traffic Act. To read more, please click here