It is challenging for courts to accurately screen and identify young trafficking victims within a criminal context. Victims rarely self-identify, and are often coached by their traffickers to conceal their exploitation from law enforcement and health-care professionals. It is common for an exploited child to enter the court system through seemingly unrelated crimes like drug possession, petty theft or even truancy. If investigative procedures are not trauma-sensitive, a child may be less inclined to disclose or engage with investigating officers. Symptoms of complex trauma such as shutting down, defensiveness or defiance can be misinterpreted by professionals as un-co-operativeness. Barriers can develop between court professionals and the child, which benefit the trafficker and increase the chances that the victim will return to her exploiter.
January is Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, which highlights a growing problem in local Nevada communities, including Reno and Washoe County. Human trafficking is often mistakenly believed to only affect urban areas and immigrant populations. In reality, trafficking is a problem in all 50 states and United States territories. Both U.S. citizens and permanent residents are being victimized. Even the tiny island territory of Guam has experienced trafficking, along with isolated rural areas and tribal reservations in the United States interior.
The National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges works extensively with courts to improve their response to domestic child sex trafficking (DCST) and commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC).
Kelly Ranasinghe, the senior program attorney for the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, says:
These DCST and CSEC cases are among the most difficult and challenging cases for juvenile courts to handle. Victims may suffer from complex trauma and require therapeutic services beyond the capacity of local jurisdictions. Child trafficking victims may exhibit delinquent conduct such as substance abuse, truancy, physical aggression or larceny fueled by trauma.
Cases are further complicated by the trafficker’s insidious practice of recruiting victims with pre-existing vulnerabilities such as mental illness, family dysfunction or trauma. Child sex traffickers target youth at critical stages in their development, warping common beliefs about gender and parental roles to construct unhealthy quasi-parental or romantic relationships. Isolation of the victim from family and social support systems is part of the recruitment process while incoherence and confusion fosters a sense of dependence, ultimately reinforcing the power and control of the trafficker.
Nevada ranks first in the nation for the arrest of minors for prostitution, nearly 15 times the national average. Nevada lacks safe harbor laws. “Safe harbor” is the colloquial term for laws designed to protect sexually exploited minors from being prosecuted for their own victimization.
In Reno, Awaken continues to dedicate its efforts to the prevention of sex trafficking and rehabilitation of victims alongside law enforcement, who are well-trained on child sex trafficking dynamics. However, despite Awaken’s and law enforcement’s monumental efforts, sex trafficking of both minors and young females continues to be problematic. Only two months ago, a John Suppression Operation resulted in nearly eleven arrests for trafficking and related crimes and the detention of three runaway exploited minors. Recent media have focused on the arrests of victims — young girls in this case — rather than those who sought to purchase sex from children. In that community, this problem is not going away and the support of the community, including the media, is needed to change the way victims are treated and how those who purchase sex from or traffic children are prosecuted.
Studies show that communities which foster coordinated community response networks tend to have the best results. In ideal situations, all agencies and providers which may contact a victim of child trafficking work in concert from the very beginning, with a mutually agreed-upon goal of recovery and support. Similarly, trauma sensitivity at every stage of the recovery process, including within the courtroom, plays a substantial role in helping minors feel like the court system is a partner in their recovery, rather than a punitive entity.
To learn more about trafficking, or how you can help combat DCST and CSEC in your community, you can visit the NCJFCJ website or the websites of its partner agencies: Futures Without Violence, Human Rights for Girls, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and the Office for Victims of Crime.
