[House Hearing, 114 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
A PATHWAY TO FREEDOM: RESCUE AND REFUGE
FOR SEX TRAFFICKING VICTIMS
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH,
GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND
INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MAY 14, 2015
__________
Serial No. 114-67
__________
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida BRAD SHERMAN, California
DANA ROHRABACHER, California GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey
JOE WILSON, South Carolina GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida
TED POE, Texas BRIAN HIGGINS, New York
MATT SALMON, Arizona KAREN BASS, California
DARRELL E. ISSA, California WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts
TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island
JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina ALAN GRAYSON, Florida
MO BROOKS, Alabama AMI BERA, California
PAUL COOK, California ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California
RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas GRACE MENG, New York
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania LOIS FRANKEL, Florida
RON DeSANTIS, Florida TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas
TED S. YOHO, Florida ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois
CURT CLAWSON, Florida BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania
SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee
REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin
DAVID A. TROTT, Michigan
LEE M. ZELDIN, New York
TOM EMMER, MinnesotaUntil
5/18/15 deg.
Amy Porter, Chief of Staff Thomas Sheehy, Staff Director
Jason Steinbaum, Democratic Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and
International Organizations
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina KAREN BASS, California
CURT CLAWSON, Florida DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island
SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee AMI BERA, California
TOM EMMER, MinnesotaUntil
5/18/15 deg.
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
WITNESSES
The Honorable Sean Reyes, attorney general, State of Utah........ 5
Mr. Tim Ballard, founder and chief executive officer, Operation
Underground Railroad........................................... 16
Ms. Karla Jacinto Romero, survivor of human trafficking and
advocate, Commission United vs. Trafficking.................... 23
The Honorable Rosi Orozco, president, Commission United vs.
Trafficking (former Mexican Congresswoman)..................... 26
LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING
The Honorable Sean Reyes: Prepared statement..................... 11
Mr. Tim Ballard: Prepared statement.............................. 20
Ms. Karla Jacinto Romero: Prepared statement..................... 24
The Honorable Rosi Orozco: Prepared statement.................... 29
APPENDIX
Hearing notice................................................... 46
Hearing minutes.................................................. 47
A PATHWAY TO FREEDOM: RESCUE AND REFUGE FOR SEX TRAFFICKING VICTIMS
----------
THURSDAY, MAY 14, 2015
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health,
Global Human Rights, and International Organizations,
Committee on Foreign Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:25 p.m., in
room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher H.
Smith (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. Smith. The hearing will come to order, and good
afternoon. It is an honor to be here with you today focusing on
the fight against human trafficking, an insidious human rights
abuse that thrives in an environment of secrecy, of silence, of
acquiescence, complacency, and of a mindset that says that it
is somehow somebody else's business. The truth of the matter is
that combating modern day slavery is everybody's business. We
are all in this together. Cooperation and coordination are key
to mitigating and someday ending this pervasive cruelty.
Significant progress has been made since I authored
landmark legislation known as the Trafficking Victims
Protection Act of 2000 to combat sex and labor trafficking in
the United States and globally. The Trafficking Victims
Protection Act of 2000 and its 2003 and 2005 reauthorizations,
which I also sponsored, launched a bold new strategy that
included sheltering, political asylum, and other protections
for the victims, long jail sentences and asset confiscation for
the traffickers, and tough sanctions for governments that
failed to meet minimum standards prescribed in the legislation.
And for the first time ever, the law recognized, and this was a
sea change effort, the exploited women, children, and men, as
victims, not as perpetrators of the crime.
Since 2004, the Trafficking Victims Protection Act has
resulted in anti-human trafficking task forces in 42 cities
across the U.S. These task forces identify potential victims of
human trafficking, coordinate local and Federal law enforcement
to rescue victims, assist with referrals for victim care, and
train law enforcement.
Today's hearing will concentrate on rescue and refuge. In
January 2000, I received actionable information that eight
Ukrainian women were being exploited by sex traffickers in two
bars in Montenegro. The women had been lured there with
promises of legitimate work, then forced into prostitution. One
desperate victim, however, called her mother for help using the
phone of one of the men that was exploiting her. When informed,
I immediately called the Prime Minister of Montenegro, Filip
Vujanovic, who personally ordered an immediate raid on the bar.
As a result, I was told, don't let the local police go. They
are on the take. They exploit the women. They are getting money
from this nefarious establishment. So he sent his own police to
rescue, and as a result, seven of the eight women were rescued
and returned to their families in Ukraine. Tragically, the
eighth woman was trafficked to Albania prior to the raid.
We now know that organized crime, street gangs, pimps
around the world, have expanded into sex trafficking at an
alarming rate. It is an extremely lucrative undertaking. A
trafficker can make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year off
just one victim. Unlike drugs or weapons, a human being can be
held captive and sold into sexual slavery over and over and
over again, turned into a commodity. Pornography and the
devaluation of women are helping to drive this demand. And
while our Departments of Justice and Homeland Security work
with law enforcement abroad in sting operations to catch
American pedophile sex tourists and to rescue victims, where
there is a nexus with the United States, they cannot conduct
rescue operations or run investigations that fall outside of
their jurisdiction.
Nevertheless there are victims, someone's young son or
daughter, today being cruelly exploited. Into this gap step
nongovernmental rescue operations. Some of the best are staffed
by former Navy SEALS, ex-CIA agents, and even the occasional
sitting member of a State Government. That is what we will hear
about today, from witnesses that include a former CIA agent now
involved in rescuing the most vulnerable, as well as from a
sitting attorney general. We will hear from a former Member of
the Mexican Congress who has fought trafficking her entire
career, and we will hear from a victim of trafficking who will
also tell us about the importance of refuge and rehabilitation
following the rescue.
Operation Underground Railroad has made it their business
literally and figuratively to identify children being sex
trafficked into other countries and then to partner with the
relevant foreign governments and their entities for the rescue
and rehab of those children.
Operation Underground Railroad members frequently pose as
American sex tourists who enlist traffickers to host sex
parties for them. It is a common occurrence in many Latin
American nations and it provides the perfect cover for
Operation Underground Railroad to lure the traffickers with the
children for sale to a preset location and then have the local
authorities ready to bust the traffickers as well as to rescue
the kids. Operation Underground Railroad also trains the local
governments on how to conduct sting operations on traffickers
and on the rehabilitative needs of those trafficking victims.
I want to thank our witnesses in advance for their
extraordinary and courageous activity on behalf of these
vulnerable people, especially kids, especially women who are at
risk. You have made an enormous difference. And the country,
the United States, the Congress, and the world, really needs to
hear what you are doing so that these great actions can be
replicated so that more people will be rescued.
I would like to now yield to my good friend and colleague,
the gentlelady from California, Ms. Bass.
Ms. Bass. Thank you, Mr. Chair, as always for your
leadership on this issue and so many other issues. I also want
to thank our distinguished guests who took the time to be here
with us today. During this hearing I look forward to discussing
strategies to address sex trafficking as an issue that we are
dealing with here in the United States as well as abroad. And
hopefully we can embrace an inclusive approach that
acknowledges the international nature of this. It is also
important to note, unfortunately, that U.S. nationals are also
perpetrators of sex crimes abroad, and I will be particularly
interested in hearing about that since I know that a couple of
you are involved in that.
We know that the issue affects millions of adults and
children, men, and women worldwide who are victimized across a
wide range of commercial sex and forced labor schemes. In the
United States and in my congressional district and in some
cities, the population that is particularly vulnerable,
especially the child population, to sex trafficking, are kids
in the child welfare system; that is an issue that we are
concerned about in my city but we have also worked on in a
bipartisan basis.
I had an experience a couple of years ago of having a young
foster child, former foster child, who told me that her
experience being in the child welfare system actually she felt
prepared her to be trafficked because she was so used to being
moved around place to place, and people who were involved with
her were all paid to be with her. And so we know that this
story here is far too common. And in a bipartisan effort to
drastically decrease the number of foster youth who experience
this horrible exploitation, I have reintroduced legislation
called Strengthening the Child Welfare Response to Trafficking
Act this year. The legislation passed the House unanimously,
and over in the Senate, the language from that bill was put in
a bill. And Mr. Chair, you might know that that is coming back
our way next week, and we hope to have it on the President's
desk very soon.
So I look forward to your testimony today and how we can
learn from what you have done around the world and how we can
apply your experiences and lessons here in the United States.
Thank you.
Mr. Smith. Thank you, Ms. Bass.
I would like to now recognize Mr. Emmer.
Mr. Emmer. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and also Ranking Member
Bass, for holding this important hearing. I can think of no
better place than this subcommittee when it comes to
highlighting the atrocious crime of human trafficking. You
should both be commended for your leadership on this issue.
When Boko Haram terrorists kidnapped hundreds of teenage
girls with the intent of selling them off into slavery, the
offense sparked international outrage and inspired action here
in the halls of Congress. I want to thank the ranking member
and Robin Kelly from this committee, as well as Congresswomen
Jackson Lee and Wilson for their persistence and leadership on
that front.
Unfortunately not all trafficking cases make the
international news. Every day children across the world are
taken from their family, from their homes, and sold and
enslaved, forced into labor and prostitution against their
will. As a father of seven children myself, I cannot begin to
fathom the agony their families must be experiencing. The
United States, to our collective shame, is not immune to this
tragedy. In America alone, hundreds of thousands are trafficked
in by transnational drug cartels and criminal organizations.
The Justice Department estimates that there are more than
200,000 children across the U.S. that are ``at risk of
trafficking.'' Human trafficking is nearly a $30 billion per
year criminal enterprise with thousands of innocent children
trafficked annually.
I am pleased that Congress, in coordination with the Obama
administration, has made great strides in combating
trafficking, but there is still much work to be done to help
victims improve prosecutions, and prevent men, women, and
children from being targeted by predators. This body must do
everything within its power and authority to stay one step
ahead of those involved in these crimes against humanity. As a
Congress we must prioritize funding to support NGOs such as the
ones before us today, nonprofits, and State and Federal
prosecutors, to see the best practices and methods of
prevention, protection, and prosecution.
One way we can combat trafficking is through safe harbor
laws that have been instituted across the country, including in
my home State of Minnesota. By protecting victims and assisting
prosecutors, by pursuing safe harbor laws at the national
level, we can better respond to this national crisis. The words
spoken here today cannot be merely symbolic gestures. They must
be followed by action and constant vigilance. Our children
deserve nothing less.
I want to thank our witnesses and the concerned citizens in
attendance for your continued efforts in this fight, and with
that I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Mr. Emmer.
I would like to recognize my good friend and colleague, Mr.
Clawson, from Florida.
Mr. Clawson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member,
for doing this hearing about such a tragic global situation. It
is hard to even fathom. And I would like to reiterate the words
of my friend, Mr. Emmer, I think it is time to bring home the
African kidnapped girls and, you know, bring home the girls.
And I know that is not the topic today, but bring home the
girls. And we need to do everything we can on that.
To the guests, you all are doing more than just talking,
and I respect action; so thank you for what you all do and the
example that you set. And we ought to learn from that, and
others ought to learn from that. And to Senorita Karlita, Karla
[speaking foreign language].
Thank you.
Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Mr. Clawson.
I would like to now introduce our very distinguished
witnesses and invite them to testify. Beginning first, it is my
very high honor and privilege to recognize and welcome the
Honorable Sean Reyes, who today serves as the 21st attorney
general of Utah, first appointed and then elected, but first
appointed in 2013. Attorney General Reyes has received
attention locally and nationally for transforming the Utah
attorney general's office and for his very direct involvement
in bringing traffickers to justice both in Utah and in South
America. Last year, for example he traveled with Operation
Underground Railroad to participate in a covert sting where he
posed as a bodyguard and translator to help liberate over 100
children from a sex trafficking ring. A public official who
doesn't just implement or enforce the law, but actually gets
right there face-to-face with the horrific tragedy, preventable
tragedy, of sex trafficking and helps to rescue those kids.
We will then hear from Mr. Timothy Ballard who is the
founder and CEO of Operation Underground Railroad and serves as
its jump team commander for rescue operations. Mr. Ballard has
worked at the Central Intelligence Agency and as a special
agent for the Department of Homeland Security where he was
assigned to the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and
deployed as an undercover operative for the U.S. Child Sex
Tourism Jump Team. He has worked every type of case imaginable
in the United States and in multiple foreign countries in the
fight to dismantle, disrupt, and bring to justice these
terrible child trafficking rings, so thank you.
Then we will hear from Ms. Karla Jacinto Romero who is now
22 years old and a survivor of human trafficking which she
suffered from the age of 12 to the age of 16. Today Karla is a
happy and successful mother of two beautiful girls, a wife, a
student, and an international activist. She has shared her
strong message against human trafficking with the Mexican House
of Representatives, in the United Kingdom, in Rome, as well as
in the Vatican. She helps rebuild the dreams of other human
trafficking survivors by both her words and by her example,
encouraging them to overcome and to love life and to trust
their neighbors again.
We will then hear from Ms. Rosi Orozco who is currently the
president of the Commission United vs. Trafficking. Since 1990,
she has worked to promote and defend human rights through
several associations, particularly in the prevention and
treatment of combating human trafficking, crime prevention,
social development, and strengthening families. She has also
acted as Federal Deputy and the President of the Special
Commission for the Fight Against Human Trafficking in the
Mexican House of Representatives and was the main proponent of
the Law Initiative to Prevent, Punish, and Eradicate the
Offenses on Trafficking in Persons and to Protect and Assist
the Victims of these crimes, which became law in Mexico. Fellow
lawmaker, welcome, and thank you for your leadership. Mr.
Attorney General, the floor is yours.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE SEAN REYES, ATTORNEY GENERAL, STATE
OF UTAH
Mr. Reyes. Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of the committee.
It is an absolute honor to be with you today along with these
distinguished witnesses to address what I consider to be one of
the greatest evils plaguing our world today, specifically child
sexual slavery, or the trafficking of children for sex
exploitation. As the attorney general of the great State of
Utah, I am the highest ranking prosecutor in our State and in
this capacity familiar with all manner of crimes. I oversee
approximately 80 certified peace officers who serve as
investigators for the State, either full-time or from partner
agencies that are affiliates of our Internet Crimes Against
Children Task Force or Secure Strike Force, both multi-agency
teams under the AG's office, focused on combating crimes such
as child sexual abuse, exploitation, and child pornography, and
disrupting the trafficking of women and children for various
reasons, including sex and sex exploitation.
While I believe trafficking of persons is one of the most
insidious of the many crimes we confront, sadly it is also one
of the least understood and least recognized by the public. And
as a father of six children, I want to change that. I know they
are looping behind me, or to the side, some of the footage of
the mission from October of last year when we went down to
Cartagena and two other cities in Colombia; and if I have time,
I will address and give you a little bit of context for that as
Mr. Ballard may also.
Today in addition to offering my support for the
International Megan's Law, H.R. 515, sponsored by the chair and
passed by the House, I would also like to paint with a slightly
a broader brush in giving texture to more comprehensive issues
pertaining to human trafficking. And to that end, let me begin
with a few generalized statistics regarding the trafficking of
persons. There are currently an estimated 20 million to 30
million modern-day slaves worldwide, people taken or lured into
servitude and held against their will. And to put that number
in perspective, that is twice as many or more modern-day slaves
than there were during the entire transatlantic slave trade
from the 16th to 19th centuries, 300 years, which was by most
scholarly accounts, 10 million to 13 million people. And I want
to be very clear that I am not saying that in any way to
diminish the blight that that is on our world history, but only
to underscore the severity and pervasiveness of what is going
on today.
Human trafficking has become the second most lucrative
criminal enterprise internationally, trailing only drug
trafficking and ahead now of even arms dealing and
counterfeiting. It generates an estimated $150 billion or more
annually but is very, very difficult to quantify because of how
little is reported. The United Nations Office on Drugs and
Crime estimates that 18 percent of the victims are forced into
hard labor. Others are conscripted into military servitude,
recruited for terrorism, forced into acting as suicide bombers,
part of illegal adoptions, or even killed to harvest their
organs on the black market. But the overwhelming majority,
approximately 80 percent, are forced into sex slavery or sex
exploitation. Sex exploitation includes forcing victims into
prostitution and compelling victims to commit sex acts for the
purpose of creating pornography.
Let me focus a few more statistics particularly on sexual
slavery. Trafficking women and children for sexual exploitation
is the fastest growing criminal enterprise in the world at this
time, this despite the fact that international law and the laws
of 134 countries criminalize sex trafficking. About 2 million
children are exploited every year in the global commercial sex
trade. That number is about 5 million if you are just talking
about trafficking in general. Women and girls make up 98
percent of victims of trafficking for sexual exploitation.
Anecdotal estimates from survivors are that only 1 in 10
victims caught up in the life ever make it out alive, so that
is 90 percent of the victims that will never make it out of the
life alive.
According to the U.S. State Department, 600,000 to 800,000
people are trafficked across international borders every year,
of which 80 percent are female and half are children. Briefly a
quote from a young international sex trafficking victim:
``They forced me to sleep with as many as 50 customers
a day. I had to give the pimp all of my money. If I did
not earn a set amount, they punished me by removing my
clothes and beating me with a stick until I fainted,
electrocuting me, or cutting me.''
When I first heard experiences such as these, I thought
that they were not humanly possible to endure. I am dreadfully
sorry to report that I was wrong, having heard now from so many
more victims that have corroborated the fact that these
children can be raped dozens, if not scores of times, each and
every day.
In February 2014, in my own home State of Utah, based on a
tip from our immigrant community and a brave man who wore a
wire to help us gather evidence, my office arrested Victor
Emmanuel Rax, a central American individual, based on evidence
of trafficking children, raping numerous young boys, and
forcing them to sell his drugs, not only into high schools and
junior high schools in our area, but even elementary schools in
the Salt Lake County area. Upon arrest we consulted with our
Federal law enforcement partners who indicated that they knew
Rax, had tried to make a case against him for many years but
that witnesses became too intimidated or disappeared in the
past. They also indicated Rax had been deported seven times to
central America where he had spent time in prison for crimes
related to drugs and child sexual abuse and was a member of a
notorious international gang. Rax had just come back into the
U.S. after each deportation. We were not willing to let him
escape again. When we, with the cooperation with our Federal
counterparts, made the decision to prosecute Mr. Rax in the
U.S. justice system and keep him here rather than deport, we
had over 60 victims and witnesses come forward to testify by
the time we filed information and charging documents. With such
overwhelming evidence, Rax took his own life during the
pendency of the trial.
With an International Megan's Law and attendant MOUs and
bilateral agreements, Guatemala or El Salvador could have
notified the U.S. to warn us of the monster within our midst.
Also these countries have the expertise, software, forensic
technology, investigative techniques, and prosecutorial
experience that we have in the U.S. and that we have readily
shared through organizations like Operation Underground
Railroad, there may never have been a Victor Rax coming to Utah
as they could have handled his case in his country of origin.
The Rax case opened my eyes to the violations being perpetrated
upon some of our most vulnerable. We have significantly
increased in our State the number of investigations and
prosecutions of trafficking cases during my administration.
Just within the past 2 weeks, I participated with my strike
force team on an undercover sting and raid of a massage parlor
we believed to be a front for sex trafficking. It was a site
that I had personally surveilled over a period of a year with
my men.
In Utah we have worked closely with legislators to enhance
penalties for trafficking and to treat victims as victims
rather than perpetrators. During the Rax case, I heard of an
organization based in Utah called Operation Underground
Railroad, which was just starting up. When I spoke to the
founder, Tim Ballard, I told him I was extremely impressed by
three things: One, the emphasis that OUR, the acronym, puts
into providing resources, counseling, training, and stability
to victims that they liberate from trafficking, and the
involvement of groups and people like Elizabeth Smart in their
organization.
Two, I was impressed by the focus on training of local law
enforcement partners in the various countries where they do
operations to give or enhance the skills, techniques, and tools
that they need to replicate the operations again and again; and
some of the most gratifying moments have been hearing from our
law enforcement partners after we have done missions in their
countries, telling us that they have had success on their own
using the techniques they learned from OUR.
Number three, I told Mr. Ballard the emphasis on letting
local partners take credit for their wins and building up
credibility with their own people and government were quite
impressive. And over the past year, dealing with them, having
participated as a partner and member of OUR, I would now add
two more quick points. The talent and dedication of Mr.
Ballard's team, former successful CIA, HSI, Navy SEAL, Special
Forces, and law enforcement personnel, and lastly the
effectiveness of the stings they set up.
As you alluded to, Mr. Chair, how do I know how effective
the stings are, because I have seen them up close and
personally, as you might be watching them on the sides here.
And if it comes back to looping, I will perhaps editorialize a
bit.
In October 2014, I joined an undercover sting operation in
Cartagena, Colombia, organized by Operation Underground
Railroad. There were two other simultaneous jumps in Armenia
and Metagene, other cities in Colombia, and because of the
success that this organization had, and here you are actually
seeing on the side the table at which the transaction occurred
where we were making the offer to buy and have a sex party. I
believe at this very moment our law enforcement partners, CTI,
or the Columbian equivalent of the FBI are swooping in to make
arrests. I think the timing of some of the clips is not
sequential, but this occurred on a group of islands off the
coast of Cartagena. We isolated the operation to minimize the
danger to anyone else and to maximize the opportunity to cut
off escape by the traffickers and to make sure that we could
assure the safety of those young girls and boys that we were
liberating.
So we had set up on an island there the site for the party.
The traffickers believed they were going to come and bring all
of these young children to have a sex party with an affluent
American businessman. Again, I was playing the role of the
translator and bodyguard, the mean and menacing player, which I
thought was a bit unfair. You see our law enforcement partners,
including Coast Guard, local police, and CTI, very well
coordinated. After months of work in excruciatingly detailed
cooperation and coordination, we isolated the young ladies and
the couple of young boys that were with them in one of those
huts and transacted at the table, upon the successful
transaction, the large amount of cash in exchange for the sex
party. You will see law enforcement here now coming to take us
down as we were posing as the sex participants and local law
enforcement.
When they finished processing the traffickers, they allowed
us to leave to head back to the airport. It was very touching
to be able to say good-bye to those young girls knowing that
many of them would be heading back home to families who had
likely prayed for their safe return for a number of years. In
other cases the families had no idea that they were actually
being trafficked. They had been duped into thinking they were
participating in a modeling agency. And so this is the type of
work that Operation Underground Railroad does, very precise
with buy-in from the highest levels of our sister nations. It
is something that they welcome with the credit all going to
their local law enforcement. And I will let Mr. Ballard finish
out explaining more about that as I have a few more things to
address before I summarize.
You see there, we saw up close the horror and helplessness
in the eyes of your girls, ages 10 to 16, after the drugs that
the traffickers had given them that very morning to take the
edge off of what they were about to experience. And during
those very moments now where it is being frozen around that
table, they offered up these young girls as if they were
desserts to be had for a minimal price. And the fear and,
again, helplessness in their eyes was something I will never
forget. Contrasted with the sense of liberation just a few
minutes later and the hope that they had that they were going
to potentially get home and be back safely with their parents.
All I can say is thank goodness that we were the ones there
that day instead of real sex tourist predators. Not only did we
liberate over 120 innocent girls and boys that day,
cumulatively with the three missions that were done
simultaneously and reunite them with families and get them much
needed resources to start the long road to recovery, but again
we trained local law enforcement with investigative techniques
and software, and they have called us numerous times to report
on their replication of other stings where they have taken down
other traffickers and saved even more children.
People ask why the Utah attorney general went to Colombia.
My reply, number one, because such a high percentage of those
travelling abroad for sex parties are American. Some statistics
suggest 80 percent or more of sex tourists may be American. I
am embarrassed by that fact, that Americans provide such
demand, and I feel a responsibility to remedy the scourge that
my fellow countrymen have helped to create.
Secondly, helping to stop human trafficking no matter where
it exists is vitally important, and to be clear, no State funds
were used. I was not going down in my official capacity as the
attorney general of Utah. In fact, nobody knew except for our
closest law enforcement partners.
Three, and I think this is critical to this discussion,
creating a firewall in countries like Colombia and the many
other countries that OUR and other organizations like them have
established to prevent future Victor Raxs from entering the
shores of the United States and my State of Utah. Through the
conference of Western Attorneys General, I and other State AGs
have conducted bilateral training with AGs in Mexico and El
Salvador to train and coordinate law enforcement resources; and
I have met with the Ambassadors of Japan, Peru, the
Philippines, and many others, including the Philippine
Ambassador just again today to discuss further coordination and
training. No leader with whom I have spoken from these
countries is opposed to this even greater coordination as
envisioned by the International Megan's Law. H.R. 515 also
wisely provides for adding to the minimum standards for the
principal diplomatic tool that the U.S. employs in this area,
the Trafficking in Persons Report by our State Department, with
its various tiers and incentives for our sister nations to
achieve Tier 1 status.
So in summary, let me say thanks. International Megan's Law
just makes sense. Codifying a requirement to alert law
enforcement authorities in destination countries will allow our
law enforcement partners worldwide to be more vigilant when
known American child sex offenders are entering their
countries, sometimes for legitimate travel, but too often for
repeat offenses of child crimes, sex parties, and sex tours.
And it will also provide law enforcement at the Federal, State,
and local levels here in the United States, a much better
chance to prevent domestic crimes when convicted child sexual
abusers from other countries enter U.S. territory.
Fighting human trafficking is not a Republican issue or a
Democrat issue. It is a humanitarian issue. It transcends any
political differences or ideological divides. Its devastating
reach grasps all walks of life and needs a united front for us
to find success and give hope to victims and survivors
worldwide.
I would urge the Senate and anyone listening to this
hearing to support passage of this law and others aimed at
curbing and eventually ending child sex trafficking. Thank you.
Mr. Smith. Thank you so very much, Mr. Attorney General.
And thank you for bringing up the International Megan's Law. It
has passed the House three times. We believe it will get its
hearing and will be acted upon by the U.S. Senate.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Reyes follows:]
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Mr. Smith. Megan Kanka--before I go to Mr. Ballard--the 7-
year-old girl who was brutally slain in Hamilton Township, New
Jersey, my hometown, no one knew that, that pedophile lived
across the street. He invited her into the house, raped her,
and then brutally killed her. And that led to the enactment of
Megan's Law in all 50 states and the District of Columbia and
throughout the territories. It is a transformational effort.
And the international part, as you know, it is all about
noticing countries of destination of convicted pedophiles.
There was a GAO report that found something like 4,500
convicted pedophiles in 1 year alone according to the
Government Accountability Office, got passports, and they are
good for 10 years, and then they go about travelling.
And they travel to places like Colombia, like Thailand,
Brazil, all over the world; and they abuse children in secrecy.
This would empower that government to deny a visa or to watch
them very closely so they don't abuse their kids. So thank you
for bringing that up as a preventative means of mitigating this
horrific crime. Mr. Ballard.
Mr. Reyes. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
STATEMENT OF MR. TIM BALLARD, FOUNDER AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE
OFFICER, OPERATION UNDERGROUND RAILROAD
Mr. Ballard. Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, and esteemed
members of the subcommittee. Thank you very much for this
opportunity.
My name is Tim Ballard. I am the founder and CEO of
Operation Underground Railroad. I served for 12 years as a
special agent for the Department of Homeland Security, where I
served on the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and
the Sex Tourism Jump Team. I worked as an undercover operative
infiltrating organizations at home and abroad who were in the
business of abusing children, sexually trafficking them.
In 2006 with the passage of the Adam Walsh Child Protection
and Safety Act, Congress opened the doors for U.S. agents to
better investigate these cases, especially internationally, and
I was one of the first agents assigned to a team that would go
out and use our undercover skills to infiltrate these
organizations, looking for American travelers who were engaging
in sex with children. I was proud to represent the United
States in dealing with this horrific issue. However, I often
felt helpless by the fact that the vast majority of the child
victims that we would find fell outside the purview of the
United States or for that matter any developed nation with the
tools that could save them. Unless I could tie a U.S. traveler
to the case, I would not be able to rescue the children, even
the ones that we were able to identify as being victims. It is
an issue of the sovereignty. It is outside of the jurisdiction,
and I understood that. However, that doesn't mean that we
couldn't be doing more.
As an agent, I once had the opportunity to work on a
specific case in Colombia. I did my due diligence, and as a
team we located children who were being trafficked. And again,
we were told that if it was not going to end in a U.S.
courtroom, that there were no resources available and there was
little we could do except send a reference, and sometimes that
is just not enough. And that was discouraging, and I grew
frustrated being told no many times, though I understood,
clearly understood the reasons why. Because of this I decided
to leave and create Operation Underground Railroad, which we
did last year.
We since went back to Colombia as a private organization,
and as we have talked about and seen on the screens, we were
able to pull off one of the largest rescue operations that we
know about by setting up sting operations that consisted of
ruse child sex parties. We were able to help the Colombians
rescue more than 120 victims in 1 day. And to see these
children, as young as 11 years old, to look into their eyes as
they are tearful, scared to death, and knowing that they were
lured out of this by various means.
This group in Colombia had actually hired a beauty queen
from Cartagena who could lend credibility to their ruse and
bring these children, and they told us as young as 9 years old,
they started recruiting them to be models when, in fact, they
were being sold and raped for money.
What is most interesting I think about this case in
Colombia is that Homeland Security agents ended up arresting a
American citizen named Dennis DeJesus. DeJesus caught wind of
our fake sex party in Colombia and was heading down from
Florida when U.S. agents arrested him. In the end, we got our
American. Evidence concluded that DeJesus had produced child
pornography and had traveled previously to Colombia in order to
engage in sex with minors. DeJesus pled guilty to child sex
crimes in a Federal court in Florida just a few weeks ago. This
case proved that when engaging the problems of international
child sex crimes, there is a good chance that a nexus to the
United States will eventually be made.
However, I never would have be able to initiate this
investigation as a U.S. agent due to the fact that the U.S.
nexus did not appear until the end of the investigation. I also
learned that once my team initiated this investigation, along
with Columbian authorities, the U.S. Embassy and the Homeland
Security Investigations, Bogota office, was more than happy to
support the case. However, without our private efforts, the
resources or the mandate to pull it off did not exist with
United States assets. This is a matter of frustration to many
of my former colleagues in the U.S. Government, these U.S.
agents. They want to do more. They need resources to do more,
more resources to do more.
The current approach by the U.S. Government to
international child sex crimes could use some adjusting. More
mechanisms need to be put into place so that the U.S. can
better engage this problem. Oftentimes it feels like our
policies and practices, though not our people or our Government
agents, take a position that a foreign problem is simply not a
U.S. problem. However, as the DeJesus case proves, when it
comes to child sex crimes, this problem is international. And
the fact that we are talking about child victims should cause
us on a moral level to find ways to remove barriers that
prevent international engagement. I have worked with many
foreign governments, and I have never seen one that does not
desire more U.S. involvement when it comes to these specific
crimes against the most vulnerable souls on earth.
Speaking of International Megan's Law, H.R. 515, here is
another opportunity, a wonderful opportunity, to attack this
problem from a different angle. It will help bridge a serious
gap. As a government agent, it was always frustrating to know
that minus a crystal ball, it would always be a serious
challenge to predict when a child sex traveler would cross our
borders to engage in illicit sex with children. As quoted in
the bill itself, legitimate studies have concluded that there
are close to 2 million children in the world currently in the
commercial sex trade; and the bill also points out that a
significant amount of these travelers are from the United
States. And I for one can testify, I know these stats are true
because I have been working in this black market for more than
10 years.
In a sad commentary on our society, the reason our cover
story has worked so well and has been so easily bought by
perpetrators is due to the fact that we are Americans. These
guys, these perpetrators are used to catering to Americans.
They are used to selling children to Americans. This is an
American problem no matter where on earth the child victim
happens to be.
In this country we proudly work under Megan's Law as a
means to encourage States to protect children by identifying
and monitoring the whereabouts of child sex offenders. As a
society we have accepted the fact that convicted sex offenders
pose a great risk to children, and so we make their presence
known. Of course, the question why would we not offer the same
mechanism to our friends overseas? And I understand it has
passed three times in the House. It is time to pass it in the
Senate, and I hope that your colleagues in the Senate are
listening, that they might hurry along.
We might picture a man who has been convicted of raping
children in a foreign country. We might imagine that this man
is coming for a visit to our towns, to our parks, and our
neighborhoods where our children play. Would we not want to
know this man's past? Of course, we would. And I assure you
that our friends in other countries want this information as
well, especially the would-be child victims of the crimes.
Advancing this bill is an opportunity to connect law
enforcement agencies around the world by arming them with
actionable intelligence that they can use to prevent child sex
crimes from occurring. This bill talks about the Angel Watch
Center. The Angel Watch Center will be a significant first step
in bridging the gap between governments and nongovernment
organizations like ours that have real experience in rescuing
and rehabilitating victims of trafficking.
One of the great benefits of being an NGO is that it allows
greater freedom for anti-child crimes experts to move about the
world, plugging quickly into any government jurisdiction and
rapidly bringing the tools to fight child crimes into the hands
of government officials who need them. We are readily afforded
access to information regarding child sex rings that is useful
to combat these rings. One of the challenges for us of course
is, establishing and maintaining direct relationships with
government officials who need and want our services. Through
the Angel Watch Center, this problem will be helped. This
center will serve as a venue where a public-private partnership
can more easily leverage all the intelligence, ideas, tools,
and strategies to best protect children at home and abroad.
Speaking for my organization, we have physically rescued
hundreds of victims in the last year alone. Advancing H.R. 515
and creating the Angel Watch Center, I believe, could double or
triple that number for us, and that is just for us. Add to that
the many other NGOs and other government agencies, foreign and
domestic, that will participate in the Angel Watch Center, and
we will be saving more children than ever before.
Let's not wait any longer to put this bill into law. The
children are desperately waiting for us. I know this because I
have seen them. Thank you very much for this opportunity.
Mr. Smith. Mr. Ballard, thank you so very much and again
for that sacrifice of leaving your employment to take on this
private sector initiative that has saved, as you pointed out,
hundreds of victims in the last year alone. That is
extraordinary. Thank you for that leadership.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Ballard follows:]
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----------
Mr. Smith. Well now I will turn to Karla Jacinto, and I
thank you for being here. Thank you.
STATEMENT OF MS. KARLA JACINTO ROMERO, SURVIVOR OF HUMAN
TRAFFICKING AND ADVOCATE, COMMISSION UNITED VS. TRAFFICKING
[The following statement and answers were delivered through
an interpreter.]
Ms. Jacinto. Mr. Chairman, and members of the subcommittee,
thank you for taking the time to listen to my story. My name is
Karla Jacinto and today I have a voice, but for more than 4
years of my life from the age of 12, as a little girl whose
mother had thrown her out on the streets, open to anyone
wanting to take advantage of my vulnerabilities, I fell prey to
a professional pimp who after 3 months of wooing and me
treating me as a princess, propped me up on a corner and forced
me to work the streets for his own gain. For years and years I
was coerced, intimidated, threatened, beaten, robbed of my
children and emotionally and sexually violated time and time
again.
During those years, I was forced to serve every type of
fetish imaginable to more than 40,000 clients. Of those, many
were foreigners visiting my city looking to have sexual
interactions with minors like me.
Please try to put yourself in my shoes, broken, abandoned,
violated, hurt, denigrated, and enslaved at a time when I
should have been playing with dolls and looking forward to a
fun day at school.
Today I am thankful to be able to stand before you as a
reintegrated woman. At the age of 16, a man that had become a
regular client was able to see beyond the short-term pleasure
into the eyes of a broken girl. He helped me escape and I
entered from the Fundacion Camino a Casa shelter. There I
received the help, care, time, attention and love that I needed
to put the broken pieces of my soul back together.
I also met Rosi Orozco, who has helped me grow into the
activist I am today. I am 22, and for the last 5 years, my life
has been dedicated to raising my voice to anyone willing to
hear that we exist, that there are thousands of little girls in
my country being used for the pleasure of those who only live
for their own desires, economic gain, and exertion of power.
It is up to us, both governments and nongovernment
organizations to work together to prevent this crime, punish
those who commit them, to look and rescue for those who are
already caught in the web, and to provide the care necessary
for their healing and reintegration into a healthy society. No
one person can do it himself or herself. We are all
responsible. We are all affected, and we can all do something.
Today, your people have chosen you to have a position of
influence that can truly make a difference. And I hope that my
story will help you make some choices that will put a stop to
this horrible crime. Thank you.
Mr. Smith. Karla, thank you so much for testifying and for
the bravery to come forward and tell your story and to admonish
all of to us do more to end this cruelty, and to help those who
have been victimized. So your story will help.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Jacinto follows:]
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----------
Mr. Smith. I would note for the record that C-SPAN is here
which means that Americans will have the opportunity to hear
all of your testimonies. And C-SPAN, you know, is independent.
It does not cover every hearing. And I am very grateful that
they are here so that your words will be heard by millions of
Americans and people around the world. So thank you.
I would like to now introduce our final witness, Rosi
Orozco, again a former deputy, author of landmark anti-human
trafficking legislation in Mexico, and now the president of the
Commission United vs. Trafficking.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ROSI OROZCO, PRESIDENT, COMMISSION
UNITED VS. TRAFFICKING (FORMER MEXICAN CONGRESSWOMAN)
Ms. Orozco. Mr. Chairman, and members of the subcommittee,
thank you for this opportunity. Today I am here out of a
profound sense of obligation to focus on the problem of sex
trafficking, especially the reality of sexual tourism and child
pornography. As you have heard, Karla was a victim of all these
crimes at the age of 12. To establish some context, I will--I
should explain a little bit of who I am. Thanks to the training
I received from your Justice Department here in Washington, DC,
2005, all my life now has been dedicated to fight human
trafficking. In all of its forms. But especially that of sexual
exploitation of women and, of course, minors.
First, as a Congresswoman from 2009 to 2012 where I was the
driving force to establish the general law to prevent, punish,
and eradicate the offenses of trafficking in persons and to
protect and assist the victims of these crimes. Since the law
took effect in 2012, and with the leadership of our President
Enrique Pena Nieto, and we have reported more than 200
convictions. Mexico now is the leader in the prosecution of
these crimes in all Latin America. More recently, as the
president of the NGO Commission United vs. Trafficking, we work
in partnership with 97 other NGOs, and we have made sure that
we communicate a clear message to every social, political,
business, art, and international platform.
In Mexico, human beings are not for sale. And we will fight
against anyone that acts against that fact. Today I am here
representing every victim of slavery in my country. Sadly,
Mexico is a country of origin, transient, and destination of
human trafficking of women, men, and children, that are being
exploited both in Mexico and the United States. It worries so
much to all of our NGOs that there has been some intention in
Congress in Mexico trying to knock down the law that protects
the human rights of victims and punishes criminals. They will
try again in September so we are working as NGOs to protect the
good parts of our law, and reform the articles that could be
better with some Congresspeople that are very committed against
human trafficking.
According to the World Tourism Organization, and the
International Labor Organization about 3 million people
traveling the world look for travel-related opportunities to
participate in sexual acts with children. Sexual tourism
affects more than 2 million children that are obligated to
prostitute themselves or work in the pornography industry.
Sexual tourism is the principal motor behind child sexual
exploitation. This is a phenomenon that in recent years has
expanded exponentially throughout the world, especially in
Asia, and Latin America with Mexico being one of the principal
countries affected, especially in the northern border towns and
beach cities.
Last year your own Homeland Security Department has
situated Mexico as the number one distributor of child
pornography in the world. This is largely due to the high
demand. Studies demonstrate that most perpetrators are coming
from the United States, England, Holland, and Germany. In a
study done by the American Bar Association we know that 47
bands of human traffickers were identified in Mexico, of which
the most renowned originate in the State of Tlaxcala, and are
very well-known for importing their victims to the United
States.
I urge you today to make sure that our country will
continue working together to put a stop to the atrocity of
human trafficking and in all its forms, all forms of human
trafficking by refining our laws and committing to communicate
and cooperate with each other. We can stop the criminalization
of victims, work to push hard to strengthen the law against
providers and consumers, ease the path for prosecution of
cases, and provide the care that victims and their families
needs to rebuild their lives.
We believe that we have been working very well with the
Ambassador Anthony Wayne, even his wife is one of the wives of
many of the Ambassadors that works with Fundacion Camino a
Casa. Karlita herself has met her. The Polaris Project is doing
a great job also in a partnership with Mexico now, and you have
a great, great Attorney General, Loretta Lynch, who is called
in Mexico, the nightmare of the pimps. And we also have a very
good Attorney General who will be the nightmare of the pimps
soon. She is new in office. And also, we have great police who
are committed against these crimes.
In truth, my passion is to work directly with the beautiful
girls that have suffered and been rescued from these horrific
crimes. I have personally worked with more than 200 victims,
shared their stories, and witnessed their struggle as they look
to reveal their lives and heal from the worst pain that can be
inflicted on a human being, the loss of their freedom and
dignity. More than anything, they need all of us to be willing
to fight for them and they deserve to be heard. Just think
about this. Most of these girls were suffering from poverty,
violence, lack of education, when they become targets of
criminals that make them also to be their slaves. So when the
heroes like the people of Operation Underground Railroad rescue
them, as a society, we owe them very much. They didn't have
what they deserve in our country. They deserve the food, the
house, the security, and education. And then we see them as
slaves. Thank you to people like the people that work in OUR,
thank you for being heroes in other countries.
We need to work a complete process of reintegration from
start to finish until they become successful people that we can
all admire, like Karla, who is with me now today. She is a
survivor of human trafficking. She was a sex slave between the
ages of 12 to 16. Seven years ago, Karla was saved by a client
who saw her beauty instead of his lust. And now she is a
worldwide activist who has spoke twice in front of Pope
Francis, has taken and shared her story with the Duchess of
Cornwall, has been with the ex-President Felipe Calderon, and
with Queen Noor of Jordan at the Trust Women Conference in
London, among many other important people.
We believe that people like Karla, if we don't help them
until they are successful, they could kill themselves, or
become criminals. When she arrived to the shelter she was full
of hate. Now she is full of love. We must work to break the
vicious circle of lack of cooperation between authorities and
NGOs. Our mistrust of the process that result of people failing
to denounce the crime and failure to prosecution. Instead, we
must create a virtuous cycle where authorities and NGOs like
OUR work together, then provide a special and dedicated care to
these teams until they become successful stories. We need to
work together with survivors until they become people of
admired by society. Only then will more people denounce the
crime of human trafficking; only then will more criminals be
prosecuted; only then will more victims be freed; and only then
less and less people will look for slaves to satisfy their
basic instincts.
Please, do not name the clients johns if they were like the
clients that Karlita had. They are criminals. They are not
johns like they were a nobody. We should treat them like
criminals. Thank you so much for hearing us.
Mr. Smith. Ms. Orozco, thank you very much for your
leadership, both in the Congress as well as now as head of an
NGO. Thank you so much. You inspire us and, obviously, you have
saved many, many lives.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Orozco follows:]
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----------
Mr. Smith. I would like to ask a few questions. We do have
three votes. If it is okay with you, and I know some of you may
have to leave, we will take a short recess and come back and
ask some additional questions. But just to begin the
questioning, and I yield to my two distinguished colleagues,
Attorney General Reyes, you talked about the 120 kids and let
me just say, undercover work whether it be in Utah, your State
or my State, New Jersey, or any State in the Union is always
dangerous work. But I would be suspect of undercover work in a
foreign country where the reliability of the law enforcement
assets may be questionable. Mr. Ballard may want to speak to
this as well--how do you vet the law enforcement people that
you make a part of your team given the distance, or even in
Utah. There might be somebody who is complicit in the
trafficking who would let the bad guys know you are coming, or
put your very life at risk.
The 120 kids, what has become of them? The whole idea of
recidivism is always a deep concern for all of us. All of you
might want to speak to that. How do you keep them out of harm's
way? I have found, because I have been in shelters all over the
world, that there needs to be a significant length of time,
months doesn't cut it. It needs to be years to really break
that cycle and turn, as Ms. Orozco talked about, the hate into
love and self-acceptance. Because the victims, unfortunately,
blame themselves far too often, and they are victims. So if you
could speak to those two issues at the outset and Ms. Bass, I
could yield to you now, and then to get the questions in
because I know Ms. Bass can't return, and then Ms. Jackson Lee.
Ms. Bass. Well, I want to acknowledge my good colleague who
is also from your State, Mia Love, Congresswoman Mia Love, who
just came. So a couple of things. I also was interested in some
of the same questions that the Congressman asked. I was very
interested in what happened to the girls, and also what
happened to the men. Because, as I watched the tape as it was
going, the first thing that came to my mind is that do they get
released, and then do they go back after the girls? You know
what I mean? Do they capture the girls?
And then I would like to ask Ms. Jacinto, if you could
please explain when you were rescued, what was it that allowed
you to not go back? And then I just want to make a brief
statement for the record.
Mr. Reyes. Mr. Chair, are you ready----
Mr. Smith. If I could, just because of time, we are joined
by Mia Love, who is obviously from your State, and a very
dedicated Member of the Congress, and caring about these
issues, and then going to my Democrat colleague, Ms. Jackson
Lee.
Mrs. Love. I first of all just wanted to say thank you for
the invite and letting me know that our attorney general and
Mr. Ballard from Operation Underground Railroad is here. The
work that they do is so incredibly important. It is something
that is very important in the State of Utah, but also for our
Nation and around the world.
This is not based on fiscal issues. This is not based on
party issues. This is what we have to do, and that is you are
protecting life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This is
a moral issue, and I wanted to say thank you so much for making
this such an important part of what you do.
I have three children, two girls, one boy, and it makes me
feel better as a parent knowing that there are some good people
out there doing this work and making sure that the predators
know that we will not rest. We will be diligent and we are
watching them and we are putting them out of business. So from
the bottom of my heart as a parent, as an American who cares
about the children all around this world, thank you for the
work that you do, and thank you for this committee for taking
this issue so seriously.
Mr. Reyes. Mr. Chair, can we say we are proud of our entire
Federal delegation especially here today. Thank you,
Congresswoman Love. She is not telling you everything. She has
actually been helpful in a number of ways, including an
operation or several operations that have occurred in Haiti,
given her Haitian heritage and we appreciate her support and
all of your support, so I just wanted to acknowledge her and
everything she has done to support Operation Underground
Railroad.
Mr. Smith. Thank you. Ms. Jackson Lee.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Well, first of all, let me thank you for
the courtesies extended by both the chairman and the ranking
member. Thank you so very much. Quickly to the witnesses, let
me thank you for your testimony. I just briefly will indicate
and ask a question, and then hopefully it will go on the
record. I am the ranking member on the Crime Subcommittee. We
want to make sure that we have some collaboration with the
Foreign Affairs Committee for filling in the holes. So my
question would be, there seems to be a gap as to dealing with
those who are not connected to the United States. We deal with
sex trafficking as the buyer, the victim, and maybe in the
State. And so my question would be general, and of course to
our Congressperson, how do we deal internationally? How do you
make sure if there is an international issue in New Jersey that
you either connect Federally or that your laws allow you to
reach to be able to ensure that their dastardly works are not
impacting New Jerseyites, people from Utah, and fill in that
gap that we don't miss those who are trying to do devastating
things to children.
Lastly, I always mention Boko Haram, way, way, far away,
but, you know the dastardly things they have done by kidnapping
girls and we believe it has an international effect. So thank
you so very much for your service.
Mr. Reyes. Thank you. Are you going to recess now, Mr.
Chairman?
Mr. Smith. No, we do have a little extra time so if you
will begin answering the questions----
Mr. Reyes. Let me quickly try to address one or some of the
questions that were posed perhaps at a surface level and then I
will allow Mr. Ballard who is our operations director----
Ms. Bass. Excuse me, and also Ms. Jacinto, because I know I
won't be able to come back, so I just really wanted to hear
from her.
Mr. Reyes. You know what, I am happy to defer too. Let's
let Ms. Jacinto address those things. And then we can come
back.
Ms. Bass. My question was whether she could recall one
thing that really allowed her to be able to stay away, and not
get pulled back.
Ms. Jacinto. My daughter. Because she was taken away from
me when she was born. That is when I really started fighting.
When she was born, when she was 1 month old she was taken away
from me, and for 1 full year.
Ms. Bass. Foster care?
Ms. Jacinto. No, no, no, the pimp, or the crime
organization took her from me, extortion, so they could
continue.
When they took her from me, that is what gave me the
strength to pull through, and one of the regular clients
recognized my situation and helped me escape and recuperate my
daughter. When they gave her back to me she had burns in her
cheeks. Every day while I was in the shelter, I wanted to learn
how to be a good mother to my daughter so that our children,
because most of the girls that are there, we have children, do
not fall prey to this crime.
I would never ever, ever want to go back to that place
because in that situation you become an object, a sexual
object. You have no other identity. And that is what makes me
stand here today and raise my voice to say ``enough.''
Mr. Smith. Thank you. We have three votes, like I said, so
in about 15 minutes or so, we will resume the sitting of the
subcommittee. Thank you very much, and we stand in recess.
[Recess.]
Mr. Smith. The subcommittee will resume its sitting, and I
do want to apologize again for the delay to our distinguished
witnesses as well as to the audience. We are joined by Ann
Wagner, a distinguished Member of the House of Representatives
from Missouri, who wrote a major bill that has passed the
House, is likely to be back in the House after being through
the Senate, that criminalizes advertising. And I would like to
yield to my good friend and colleague for any comments about
her bill which I think will make a huge difference, and any
questions that she might have of our panel.
Mrs. Wagner. Well, I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank
you for a lifetime of leadership on this issue for all of those
giving a voice to the most vulnerable and those who are
oftentimes voiceless. I served 4 years as a United States
Ambassador in Western Europe, and was very familiar with human
trafficking vis-a-vis the international aspect of things. But I
will tell you, it wasn't until I came home to my own country in
2009, decided to run for office myself, put my own name on the
yard sign, dug into a few things, and realized how prevalent
this scourge, this modern-day slavery is, and the prevalence
here domestically in our own country.
This is, domestically, a $9.5 billion business. There are
upwards, according to the Justice Department, of 300,000,
mostly young girls, at risk for this. And we as a Congress,
other than reauthorizing the fantastic work that Chairman Smith
has done, really had not gotten up to date on some of the new
technologies, and the new things going on over the last decade,
so I brought this up. I am on the Financial Services Committee.
I do a lot in defense, and veterans issues, but this, this,
fighting this scourge of human trafficking and sex slavery is a
passion of mine. And so we went forward, introduced several
pieces of legislation last Congress. I can tell you in January,
along with Chairman Smith's bill and many others, we passed 12
pieces of legislation for human trafficking in January out of
the House of Representatives. The Senate has taken a number of
them up. They worked things out and four of those will be
coming back to us next week which we were very excited about;
things that will bolster law enforcement, and prosecutors, and
give you, sir----
Mr. Reyes. Tools that we need.
Mrs. Wagner [continuing]. The tools that you need and that
you have been asking for. You know, I can't tell you enough,
truly, our attorney general of Utah, General Reyes, the kind of
work that you have been doing to fight this on a day-in-and-
day-out basis, but we are going to give you some of the tools,
the resources, and help those victims in terms of safehouses,
and education, and awareness.
My particular piece of legislation is called the SAVE Act,
and it goes on, and in the last 12 years or so, obviously, the
Internet has just blown up and skyrocketed. And there are these
online predators and advertisers on outlets like backpage.com,
and many others that make it--I hate to say it but it is the
truth--make it as easy to order up a young 14-year-old girl to
their hotel room as it is a pepperoni pizza. It is deplorable.
So this does not go after the Communications Decency Act.
It is not going after any kind of freedom of speech issue. This
goes into the criminal code. And in the criminal code, section
1591, for human trafficking there is a litany of words that
constitute human trafficking. It is things like transporting,
harboring, coercing, and on, and on, and on. And all we did was
simply add advertising. And I don't care whether it is a
billboard or a flier, or something you see in the back of a
magazine or one of these online predators that are making, let
me tell you, $4 million to $5 million a month off of selling
our women and children, and young boys too.
So I recognize the work that many of you are doing from an
international basis and I support that wholeheartedly. We have
a number of great pieces of legislation like the International
Megan's Law and other things that are so very important to our
world society as we fight this scourge.
But I do want to always remind folks that this is hiding in
plain sight in our own backyards, in our own cul-de-sacs, in
our own faith communities, in every school district. And we
have to not just do things legislatively. We have to lift
education and awareness. I met with a group of superintendents
last week when I was back in the district, and I said, you guys
are fantastic. You do programs about bullying, about heroin,
about boundaries, and maybe sexual assault, but have we ever
discussed sex trafficking? How we ever discussed how these
predators go online and what they are looking for. Maybe that
nanny job isn't a real nanny job. Maybe that modeling job isn't
a modeling job. Maybe whatever it may be, there are tools that
we need to provide our youth and, frankly, our counselors and
others.
So we are working with convention, and visitor's bureaus,
with transportation outlets, with healthcare professionals,
obviously, with our prosecutors and our law enforcement, but I
want to take it to the next level, which is educational
awareness in our schools.
So I am just so thrilled that after 3 years, we are going
to have a number of pieces of human trafficking legislation
that have passed the Senate, are moving back to the House for
final passage here and I do believe that the President will
sign this legislation. It is much needed. So I applaud the work
that all of you are doing. I am so grateful to Chairman Smith
for always shining a bright light on this issue. And I stand
with you both internationally and domestically. And I have to
tell you, General Reyes, the work that you are doing, and your
commitment to this cause is absolutely head and shoulders above
anyone that I have seen, literally, in the States, so I thank
you, sir.
Mr. Reyes. Thank you so much. Thank you, Congresswoman.
Thank you Congresswoman Wagner, and we so appreciate your fight
to get us those tools that we need. It will be effective and we
will use them. We won't let them go to waste combating these
perpetrators and offenders. I know you are doing the State of
Missouri proud and we feel that support from you. So let me
just tell you brava. Thank you for your work.
And Chairman Smith, if you would like, let me say again,
reciprocally, from our vantage point, we applaud everything
that you all do. But there has been no greater warrior in
Congress on behalf of fighting for the rights, fighting for
these poor innocents than you, Chairman Smith, and we really
take our hat off to you.
Mrs. Wagner. Hear, hear.
Mr. Reyes. Thank you for everything that you have done, not
on human trafficking, on so many different humanitarian issues,
and for the time that you have allowed us to have today to
hopefully educate just a little bit more our peers, our
countrymen and our fellow men worldwide and women about this
issue.
You had a couple of questions. I am going to do my best to
address----
Mr. Smith. Before you go on, I do hope other attorneys
general and their staffs get to see this on C-SPAN and perhaps
by amplification by the media, because you set a standard, an
example that needs to be followed. This is a winnable war. We
all know that, and every effort that is made, every smart
effort will lead to prevention of trafficking, protection for
the victims, and prosecution of this nefarious trade.
So thank you for your leadership and I would join you in
thanking Congresswoman Wagner because she, first, as you know
an Ambassador and working on the executive branch side, but now
as a lawmaker is making a huge difference. This is a winnable
war. So thank you. And we need every State to do what you are
doing. They don't all want to go undercover and rescue precious
children in Colombia. But they can use their tools and their
capacity to end this egregious practice. So thank you. And I
did ask a few questions----
Mr. Reyes. I will get to those questions. One thought
occurred. Congresswoman, if you want some ideas about school
programs, training on how to avoid being victims of child
sexual trafficking or being victims of other sex crimes, please
come talk to me afterwards. We have some fantastic ones in Utah
and we would love to share them with you. And also, again,
notwithstanding the praise and the recognition that you gave, I
don't want to accept a disproportionate amount of credit for
what my colleagues, my other attorneys general throughout the
United States are doing, have done before me, and will continue
to do. There are many great leaders on the Republican side, the
Democrat side throughout the great States of our Nation who
have taken a lead on combating human trafficking. And so again,
on behalf of all of them, our national attorneys general, they
are the frontline in many instances in this fight, and I want
to pay respect and credit, and give credit to all of them.
To your questions, though. You asked what happens to
survivors. And let me break that down domestically and
internationally. Domestically, from our office in the State of
Utah, we work with our Division of Child and Family Services,
we work with nonprofits like the Elizabeth Smart Foundation,
because in spite of the fact the liberating element of these
operations gets the lion's share of the media attention, and it
is kind of the exciting parts, the stuff you see on the news,
we all know who work in this area that the true heavy lifting
comes after the fact when these victims become survivors and
then need the resources educationally, training, jobs,
counseling, treatment, physical and psychological support and
it is going to take in some cases a lifetime to help them
overcome the atrocities that they have just endured. And so
organizations like the Elizabeth Smart Foundation,
domestically, safehouses that we work with are part of the
comprehensive approach that we have taken to address what
happens to these survivors now that they have been liberated.
Internationally, each country is different. Each country
has different resources. Each country has a different capacity
to provide resources, but one of the things that I admire most
about Operation Underground Railroad, is that they will refuse
to work with a country, or they will even forestall operations
until that country gives its absolute commitment to give every
resource available that they do have, to helping the victims
once they are liberated. And in the case of Colombia, we worked
with a humanitarian organization called Renacer, the rebirth,
along with the Colombian Federal and state resources. So their
equivalent to child family services.
You know, we need to put so much--you mentioned,
Congresswoman, safehouses. The reason why only 1 out of every
10 leave the life alive is that there is no safety valve for
them. They want to leave. They want to get away and so often
there is no place for them to escape and so these safety houses
are another way that we can help encourage them to leave and
give them the protection of the State and Federal Government
resources.
The second question, really quickly, that I want to touch
on, you asked, Mr. Chair, how do we vet our Government
partners? And to be candid with you, during the entire
operation that I was on in Colombia, I really was more worried
about potential false friends in the government maybe turning
us over, or turning us into a cartel than I was about the
traffickers. You know, neutralized them pretty quickly and they
weren't an extreme physical threat. I will say this: OUR vets
through a combination of their own international contacts,
recognizing that many of them used to be former CIA operatives
and members, and have established trusted relationships over
decades along with our Federal Government agencies like HSI who
help us vet and give us a measure of comfort with the actual
agencies that we work with hand in hand to take down these
criminals abroad.
So the reality has been testified to earlier, is that there
are agencies that aren't as credible, and we do have to worry
about them, and we are very careful. And there still is an
element of risk. And no matter how much vetting and due
diligence that you do, but that is a risk we are ready to
accept when it comes to saving these little ones and bringing
them back to their families. I will let others address the
questions too.
Ms. Jacinto. Congresswoman Wagner, I would like to commend
the work that you are doing on behalf of me and the girls that
I now know are in the shelters. I know a very good friend of
mine called Anita, she is in the book that Rosi provided for
you, who was sold in advertisements in the newspaper. And it is
exactly because of Anita's testimony in our Congress that
Mexico has already adopted a law against this type of
advertising. So thank you for working on that. I would also
like to thank Tim and OUR and Attorney General Reyes for the
work they do. In our shelter in Mexico City, we have a rescued
victim that OUR rescued. Her name is Bibi. She lives with us,
and I work directly with her helping her with her whole
process. So we are happy to say that there are places where the
girls that they rescue end up being well taken care of.
Mr. Smith. Let me just ask what the role in, particularly
in the healing process. I have actually been in shelters in
Russia, Peru, Bolivia, Ethiopia, Romania, Ukraine, Italy,
Bosnia just to name a few of the countries, and I have observed
a marked difference in terms of the positive impact on women
and young girls when there is a faith-based component of some
kind. Some are run exclusively--in Bolivia and Peru they are
run by nuns. And young girls in Peru--Greg and I were in the
ones in Ethiopia, and Piero and I were in the ones in Peru and
some of these other Central and South American countries. And I
was really touched by how the healing seems to go so much
further when there is a faith-based component.
I am wondering what you think about that. Pope Francis,
among other distinguished clerics, has made this a high
priority, this combating human trafficking and caring
especially for the victims. I am wondering, you know, what your
thoughts on that might be?
Ms. Orozco. Well, of course, in Mexico we work with three
shelters. The only ones that help victims of human trafficking,
and the three of them have that component.
Mr. Smith. Has what, faith-based?
Ms. Orozco. Yes, faith based. And we believe that that is
very important until they really are successful. I am so proud
now of Karlita because, you know, they do a book of dreams, and
we all, these 97 NGOs, we help them to succeed. We also work in
jails with the pimps. That has been very powerful. If you can
watch the CNN documentary that is called ``Human Merchandise,''
you can watch one of the pimps who is asking forgiveness to one
of the friends of Karlita. That also is in the book, Marcella.
All of the girls that you can see in the book are successful
victims because all of them know now that they are special;
that they were created to do an important mission now, and
because of that, also these pimps, Karlita has been in jail
with them, and it is very powerful to the restorative justice.
And they have been able to ask forgiveness to the victims. That
is powerful too.
Mr. Smith. Thank you.
Mr. Reyes. Well, let me say this, Mr. Chair, we certainly
are welcoming to all organizations of whatever background that
want to join the fight. But so many of our best partners in
this effort are faith-based organizations and it does have a
powerful impact in the healing process that I have seen. On a
side note, I remember when I let my staff know that I was
heading down. I have a chief civil deputy who is a two-star
Army general, somebody that I greatly admire, a hero of mine.
And he said to me--atypical of his usual deference to my
position--he said, ``Boy, I wouldn't send my own troops down
where you are going. You can't go.'' And my response to him
was, ``General, I feel like God is on our side in this effort,
and that He will protect us.'' And that I have counselled with
so many of those survivors who have said that it was really God
and faith that kept them alive throughout the process. And so,
of course, in the healing process, I would expect that God and
faith would play a critical role, and I am not ashamed to say
that.
I think that that is an important component of it. Whatever
someone's conception of what God or faith may be, I think it is
critical.
Last thing, and this is, I guess, the beauty of having C-
SPAN cover this, I get texts from people saying, oh, you need
to cover this or that that you forgot to say. In terms of the
girls that we worked with, many of them were able to get back
to their families. And I think that is what people were curious
about. Did they get home to their families? In some sad cases,
it was their families that sold them in the first place, or the
family environment is not a stable enough one where we feel
comfortable putting them back in that environment. And so
again, with our Government partners, and our nonprofit
partners, both domestically and internationally, we take a very
careful look at making sure we put these children, of course,
with a deference to their families first, in a situation where
they can win because the last thing we want to do is liberate
them and set them up for failure without the resources that
they deserve.
So it is true because people ask, sometimes their families,
their direct immediate families were the ones that decided to
profit from them, and so they may go to next of kin. However, I
wouldn't be too judgemental. In many cases the families did not
know that they were putting their children in harms way. In
this very case they thought they were giving them a chance to
make more money in 1 year in a modeling agency which is part of
that culture, beauty pageants, than both parents could make an
in a decade. And so then, you know, why wouldn't they want to
help support their number of other siblings, and they
innocently let their children go to be part of that.
There are English exchange programs. The women that we help
liberate in my State, the victims we found out that they
thought they were signing up for a United States cultural
program or an English language program, and the wily
traffickers, the ones who are cagier, will often, with a gun to
the heads of the victims, essentially figuratively or
literally, have them Skype their families every month to say,
things are going great here. We love it in America. Learning a
lot. But in the meantime, they are put 10 to 20 in a little
flat, again beaten, raped, drugged, abused, and forced to be
prostitutes, and their humanity is taken away, their dignity is
stripped away.
So we do everything we can on the back end to give them
chances to reintegrate and be successes like our hero here
today. She said she admired us, but she is a real heroine to
all of us. So again, thank you for your time. Thank you for all
of your efforts. We hope your Senate colleagues are listening
carefully to the testimony today.
Mr. Smith. Thank you for your strong appeal for the
International Megan's Law. Coming from a person with your
experience and knowing the direct impact it will have, it is
very, very powerful.
Let me just--I have one final question. I yield to my
friend Mrs. Wagner for any additional questions she might have.
But one of the emerging phenomenons that we have seen, is that
it is not just organized crime, but it is gangs that has
embraced human trafficking in a very, very despicable way. We
have had a number of busts in my own State of organized crime,
of that too, but of the gangs. And these young girls that are
being exploited are 14, 15, 16 years old and if you could speak
to that as an emerging threat because this seems to be going
from bad to worse. Gangs do bad things with drugs, they do bad
things relative to violence of other kinds and they are now in
the trafficking business of human persons.
Ms. Orozco. Yeah, also we have that punishment to the
people who are in organized crime, or gangs that will take
these young people, like to sell drugs, or to be forced to do
crimes, and it is happening in our country. We are fighting
against that. And also, we are having agriculture people forced
to labor, and we just had a new girl who also escaped from
being forced labor in--it was like a dry cleaning.
Ms. Jacinto. Yeah, a dry cleaning.
Ms. Orozco. Dry cleaning, and she was even with chains in
her body 2 years. She is devastated. It is the worst case, and
it is happening and that is why the laws have to be reformed
and we congratulate you because we can see in your heart that
you have a passion to protect dignity and freedom. Thank you.
You have the same spirit of Abraham Lincoln, and we are very
happy to be here with you.
Mr. Smith. Well, thank you. And thank you for your
leadership.
Mr. Reyes. The dynamic you described, Mr. Chair, I believe
is an accurate one, more and more. In fact, I think the
prevalence of those who are traffickers is less from large,
organized criminal structures and rather either smaller gangs
or one-off cells. The vast majority of those traffickers that
we encounter, especially when we are doing our operations, are
really small. And ironically, and in fact in Colombia, the
intelligence that we received on that particular cell that we
busted came from high-level narcotraffickers. And, you know,
perhaps there is honor amongst thieves. They said, you can
handle this two ways: Either we will take care of these guys
our way, and that might be a lot of collateral damage and
carnage or the government can do something about it. And the
government reached out to Operation Underground Railroad and
said, Tim, please come in right now and help us devise a way to
go after them without endangering other citizens. And so again,
to my point, it seems to be less and less huge cartels, and
much more just small organizations. Because historically, the
downside has been very small. There hasn't been that much
disincentive in terms of the laws that have been out there or
enforcement. Things are changing with the laws that you are
helping us pass domestically, Congresswoman Wagner. Things are
changing, Chairman Smith, because of the International Megan's
Law that will hopefully eventually be the law of the land. But
I think that was an astute observation that you brought up.
Mr. Smith. Thank you. I would like to yield to
Congresswoman Wagner.
Mrs. Wagner. And I would agree with you, General, that a
lot of this is maybe not large cartel business, but it is big
business. And at the end of the day, it is follow the money. I
will tell you that here domestically any given pimp generally
traffics about six to eight women. They make $150,000 to
$200,000 a year off of each one of those victims. And it is
absolutely, as I have said before, deplorable. What lifts me
up, though, and gives me great hope are people like you,
Karlita, and survivors, and people that are willing to come
forward and tell their stories.
I have been to the safehomes and the shelters. I have
worked with these young people. I have been on sting operations
myself--probably not quite on the frontline as you were,
General--but I have been there when we have saved two young
women and caught two pimps at the same time.
Mr. Reyes. Congratulations. That is wonderful.
Mrs. Wagner. And you know, so we dig in big time. And at
the end of the day there are things that we can do
legislatively, obviously. But education an awareness are
absolutely key, and I can't stress that enough. Across the
board everywhere, whether it is our schools, whether it is in
our hospitals, whether, as I said, it is in our convention and
sports--St. Louis, my hometown, sadly, is in the top 20 for
human trafficking, mainly because of its logistical location
and its interstate access. So there are also things that I
think that we can do. And we are putting some legislative teeth
behind studies and bringing together research and information
with who the most vulnerable are. Who are the ones that are
most likely to be victimized, so that we can take care to watch
out and over them and give folks the resources and the
information about how to not fall prey to this kind of
victimization in the first place.
So again, I applaud your efforts. It is a labor of love,
and one that I feel very, very passionately about. I have got a
young daughter. I have nieces. I care about their future, the
future of all of our young children and grandchildren, and I
will fight legislatively. I will fight for education and
awareness on this issue until the last breath in my body.
And I thank you, General. I will absolutely get with you.
Some of my staff is here and we are working, as I said, on some
best practices and programs for some of the schools. And I
think we have gotten their attention. So I applaud you and I
thank you, and I thank you Mr. Chairman, for giving me the
latitude and the time today to come before you.
Mr. Smith. Thank you. As we conclude, I will just talk
about situational awareness, one of the best practices that is
of absolutely almost no cost except for the training, and that
is to train airline flight attendants and as well as the pilots
to recognize. A woman named Nancy Rivard has come up with--and
others--has come up with Airline Ambassadors International, a
wonderful program so that the flight attendants become
situationally aware. They become eyes and ears during a flight.
It ought to be done on trains and at bus stops as well. And
then law enforcement is advised in a timely fashion, in the
case of a plane as it lands, to be there, to ascertain whether
or not there is a trafficking in progress. And there have been
a number of tremendously encouraging stories where this has
absolutely broken the cycle.
Coming out of Haiti, American Airlines was able to break a
cycle of little children where a pedophile ring was broken.
Flights coming out of Russia to Chicago where every couple of
days there would be a number of Russian girls, young girls,
teenagers, with one guy. There is something wrong with that
picture. Turns out it was a trafficking ring and the flight
attendants were situationally aware enough to make sure the
pilot called ahead. So it is something we need to get in all of
Latin America, all of Asia, all of Europe, Africa, so that
thousands of airline flight attendants and the pilots and crew
will be aware of what it looks like not to be law enforcers,
not to put the potential victims at risk or themselves, but
again, to phone ahead so that when that plane lands, they are
rescued and the traffickers apprehended and prosecuted.
Mr. Reyes. Be our eyes and ears. Or theirs. And the
trucking association has been terrific partners as well in some
of ships and all of those together. We need everyone.
Mr. Smith. We do.
Ms. Jacinto. Mr. Chairman, would you mind repeating the
person that wrote the program?
Mr. Smith. Sure. Nancy Rivard and it is Airline Ambassadors
International. And we actually at the Department of Homeland
Security, have a best practices module, or training capacity
called Blue Lightning, so that needs to be replicated
everywhere, including our own airlines. Delta has undertaken
this, but far too few of our own airlines, certainly in Mexico,
and you know, all of the other airlines need to be looking at
it as well. Anything you would like to say before we conclude?
Mr. Reyes. No. Thank you, again. I would just concur with
Congresswoman Wagner that education and awareness ultimately
will be the biggest deterrent to fighting this. We can't just
investigate and prosecute our way out of this problem. And when
you are ready to come to Utah for an undercover sting, come on
out. We will get you a flack jacket and we will put you to
work, Congresswoman. Thank you. Congressman Chaffetz has been
out with us several times.
Mr. Smith. And he does send his best. He is at a top secret
briefing right now, or he asked me to convey to you that he
would be here to welcome you. Thank you so much.
Ms. Orozco. We just want to give you our blue heart. This
is the U.N. blue heart for human trafficking. Humans are not
for sale. Thank you.
Mr. Smith. Thank you. And thank you again for your bravery
in coming forward and telling your story as well. The hearing
is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 5:02 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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