Human Trafficking in Nebraska

Human Trafficking in Nebraska

Hearing on Thursday 1:30 pm.
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http://www.dailynebraskan.com/news/new-bills-introduced-to-help-prevent-human-trafficking-issues-1.2700800#.TztmmU6PWNU

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Great news, Google just gave $11.5 million dollars to help fight human trafficking.

Read about it here: ARTICLE

Human Trafficking in Nebraska -- Interim Study Hearing

Today there was a hearing held at the Nebraska Capitol. It was an interim study that was being conducted in order for the senators in the judiciary committee to find out exactly how big of a problem human trafficking is in our state.

Let me add here that it has been a huge learning experience for me to have been involved this past year in following the human trafficking bills in Nebraska. A year ago I would've read that first paragraph and said "huh??" Here's an easy to understand graph of how a bill becomes a law. If you've looked that over, what it DOESN'T say is what an interim study is. An interim study takes place if the bill does *not* move out of the committee (picture #3). (There are many committees with different topics, such as education, agriculture, revenue, etc.)If the committee deems the problem is important they will study the issue in between sessions. See, the senators in the Legislature are in session from January-February of each year, in between times they have other full time jobs and study the bills. They have a hearing regarding the topic, and the human trafficking one occurred today! Following? If not, maybe just call me, it would be easier to understand if I talked you through it. Also, I do have a limited knowledge, I may've misstated something above, just for the record :)

There were two bills that were regarding human trafficking in Nebraska last legislative session. One was about escort services (which are essentially underground prostitution and human trafficking rings), the other was about strengthening our human trafficking laws. When presented to the committee, the senators were very surprised, they did not realize--like many of us--that human trafficking was a problem in Nebraska. They decided, rather than move the bills on, to study the topic in order to craft another bill that would be more encompassing. Hopefully the bill will address concerns such as: strengthening our human trafficking laws, regulate escort services, make the punishment higher for men soliciting sex with minors (currently it is a misdemeanor), give more education to law enforcement and provide safe homes/beds for women who want to escape/have escaped with no place to go.

----LINK--->HERE IS AN ARTICLE ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED TODAY!!
It is accurate and I recommend that you read it--there were many informed people who presented at the hearing today.

The notes I took at the hearing were rather scattered, but here are some thoughts/things that I wrote down.

One thing I was astounded by was that men (primarily, but also women) who are engaging in sex with a minor are usually charged with "pandering" which is a class 4 felony--the lowest class to be charged. This means that they are essentially charged with a misdemeanor and given a fine (this year a man was charged $350, as quoted by Casady in the article). When the fine is paid, the misdemeanor goes off your record--a slap on the hand! Your wife, boss, friends don't find out--it's easy. This is why we need to strengthen our laws.

Here is another quote by Casady, directly from the article:

Lincoln Public Safety Director Tom Casady said most people who are trafficked are exploited because they have mental illness, are poor or drug addicted. A couple of years ago, he examined the histories of 10 prostitutes and found they had a combined record of 105 runaways, 44 child abuse reports and 35 sex assaults all before age 19.

My question is what are we doing to help these girls *before* this happens? It is a breakdown in the family. We need to stand together and be watchmen for the children--we live in such a broken society, but we cannot give up! As Christians, we are carriers of LIGHT and are called to bring light to the world through Jesus Christ because of his sacrifice.

I am reading a book called Mending the Soul: understanding and healing abuse. I am not very far, so I am wary of recommending it, but I'll let you know my thoughts once I finish (not that you should take my opinion..). Here are few questions to ask (pg 22):

-Why are adult female prostitutes three to four times more likely than nonprostitutes to have been physically or sexually abused in childhood?

-Why is it that women who have been abused during childhood are significantly more likely to be revictimized in adulthood?

-Why is it that 50 to 70 percent of psychiatric inpatients and 70 percent of all psychiatric emergency room patients report a history of childhood physical or sexual abuse?

Tough questions. I've been wrestling with them ever since I read that page.

One last quote:

Nebraska and Iowa are among 41 states and the District of Columbia that lack strong laws to punish the perpetrators and protect the victims of child sex trafficking, according to a new national report.

The report, released last week by the advocacy group Shared Hope International, gave Nebraska a grade of F and Iowa a D. Ten states received higher grades, including four that received B's: Illinois, Missouri, Texas and Washington. No state received an A. http://www.omaha.com/article/20111204/NEWS97/712049881

Please continue to pray for Nebraska to be SLAVE FREE. Pray for the victims AND the perpetrators AND the Senators involved in drafting the bills (specifically Senator McGill). Pray that the Holy Spirit would help them to draft a bill that will confront the issues of human trafficking in Nebraska head on.

One big concern that was brought up at the hearing is nobody seems to know how big or widespread the problem is. We suspect this is simply the tip of the iceberg. It is difficult to draft a bill with out having empirical data. Pray that the Holy Spirit would lead and reveal information.

Innocence Lost

I'm having a hard time just jumping into human trafficking, so I'm going to attempt to break it into peices. It's a huge issue, but here is some relevant info regarding human trafficking in the Nebraska/Omaha metro area.

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The FBI started a project in 2003 called "Innocence Lost" in order to find out and address the growing problems of the sex trafficking in the United States. Starting with 14 task forces in cities with the most reports of child prostitution, it has grown to currently 39.

There is now one in Omaha.

The Omaha FBI Innocence Lost Task Force has been in operation for about a year. It investigates sex trafficking in the area.

Weysan Dun, Special Agent of the FBI for the Innocence Lost Project in Nebraska said, “Since its establishment in January 2010, the FBI in Nebraska has recovered six underage children in twelve months. Some of the Nebraska children were found as far as the east coast”.

Tom Casady, Lincoln Public Safety Director noted that, “Half of female run a ways in Lincoln end up in the sex industry. Lincoln had 298 missing persons reported in 2010 -http://nebraskafamilycouncil.org/media/IPN.10-11.2011.HumanTrafficking.pdf

THERE IS TRAFFICKING HAPPENING IN NEBRASKA.

Here's one true story. Feb 2011 -- COUNCIL BLUFFS! A brothel was busted. The FBI was handling the case. The brothel was a *house* in a *residential area*. They targeted girls as young as 15. The pimp (or madam) was a woman. Her husband was there also, and their nephew played the part of the charming, good looking guy who would prowl around at high school football games in order to get vulnerable girls to come hang out at his house 'for fun' before being forced against their will to be sex slaves.

I heard an FBI agent talk about this case last month. The agent shared about many other things that they are doing in the area--it was very eyeopening and they are really doing everything they can to rescue these girls, but we as Nebraskan citizens and Americans need to become educated on this topic in order to be aware of what is going on! Being aware of the issues is a very obvious and beneficial way that we can help our local law enforcement and America as a whole, no matter what issue we are talking about here [I say this being also conscious of that fact that there are many issues I am not informed about. We all need to start somewhere. Let us not be apathetic!]. It's easy to point fingers at the traffickers, or to the prostitutes, or the men soliciting sex. Ignoring the problem only makes it worse. We are all broken people and the root of our sin is boiled down to our separation from God. Because of His grace, we need to stand up and stand in the gap for the children of God who need help.

-----As of Dec. 31, 2010, there were 85,820 active missing persons in America.
-----38,505 (44.9%) are minors.
-----289 of them were from Lincoln alone
---------->Where are these people??

source

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Please pray for the Innocence Lost task force in Nebraska, for the safety of the agents and their families, as well as the girls they are trying to rescue. Also pray for justice to be served to the traffickers.
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Here are a few more articles about that case:
http://www.kcci.com/r/26788047/detail.html
http://www.ketv.com/mostpopular/26773902/detail.html
http://www.ketv.com/news/26781693/detail.html