This document from Cunningham Children's Home provides information about developing a policy to address human trafficking. It defines human trafficking as sex or labor trafficking, describes how trafficking occurs locally and impacts youth. Signs of trafficking in youth are discussed. The recruitment, control, and psychological impacts on victims are explained. Strategies are presented for identifying trafficking, engaging respectfully with victims, understanding why youth stay or relapse, and preventing trafficking through education, empowerment and addressing vulnerabilities. Resources for further information are included.

1. Cunningham Children’s Home

2. Purpose for Policy:
 Understand how Human Trafficking affects those in
the United States, and Illinois specifically
 Learn to identify signs of Human Trafficking
 Learn prevention tactics
 Identify how we will implement a Human Trafficking
Policy at Cunningham
 Provided with knowledge about the Human
Trafficking industry
 Decrease risk of Cunningham youth getting involved
in Human Trafficking

3. What is Human Trafficking?
 Human trafficking is classified as labor or sex
trafficking
 Labor Trafficking: recruiting, harboring,
transporting, or obtaining persons
through force, fraud, or coercion for
involuntary labor/work/services of
economic or financial value
 Sex Trafficking: – when a commercial
sex act is induced by force, fraud, or
coercion unless the victim is under 18
years in which evidence of force, fraud, or
coercion are not needed. This can include
commercial sex acts such as sexually
explicit performances or pornography.
 Trafficking does not require physical
movement of a victim, it can include
commercial sex acts such as sexually explicit
performance or the production of
pornography.
 In cases involving minors, force, fraud, or
coercion is not needed for the acts to be
considered human trafficking

4. Human Trafficking Close to Home
Throughout the U.S. Throughout Illinois
 The U.S. is the second highest destination in
the world for trafficked women
 Between 14,500 and 17,500 people are
trafficked into the United States each year.
However, more than 50% of victims in the U.S.
are U.S. citizens, and most are women and
children
 325,000 children are commercially sexually
exploited in the USA annually
 $250,000 is the amount of profit that can be
made from one trafficked woman in the U.S.
 Online sex ads and forums constitute the
number one platform for buying and selling
sex with minors and young women. Those
advertised “are often made to appear that they
are working independently, when in fact they
are victims of sex trafficking”
 Chicago is a national hub for human
trafficking. Among the Midwest ports of
entry, Chicago experiences the highest volume
of arriving immigrants and trafficking victims.
 O’Hare airport is a strategic location for
trafficking
 In metropolitan Chicago, 16,000 to 25,000
women and girls are involved in the
commercial sex trade annually. 1/3 trafficked
are under 15
 Average age for entry is between 15 and 18
 Popular locations in Illinois for sex trafficking
are massage parlors and strip clubs
 Rantoul is known for high risk of labor
trafficking
 Champaign had 2 cases of human trafficking
in the last year

5. Sex Trafficking Story
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PLAPvxbYTM&f
eature=youtu.be

6. Recruitment Process
Obtaining Victims Keeping Victims
 Human Traffickers act as different links in the
trafficking chain. Their job is either:
 Recruitment
 Transportation
 Transfer
 Harbor
 Receipt of Persons
 Human traffickers lure their victims by using charms,
lies, and deception. With promises of making money
and living better lives.
 Traffickers can also become the “lovers” or legal spouse
of a victim. This is based on false reality and only to
grow in finances for the trafficker
 Abduction – once the trafficker has obtained the
victim they utilize physical and psychological threats,
humiliation, sleep deprivation, and malnutrition to
maintain control
 Target victims that are vulnerable, that have the need
to feel “included”, like family or a lover
 Debt Bondage - victim is told that they now owe their
trafficker for the money spent on transportation, food,
clothes, accommodation, etc.
 Forced drug use
 Threatening to harm the victims family
 Locking up the victim
 Telling the victim that running to the police will lead
to arrest and imprisonment
 Lives are completely dependent on the trafficker for
when they eat, sleep, receiving basic necessities, and
are subjected to repeated physical and sexual violence
 Typically, the victim is completely controlled, which
leads to fear of leaving
 Anyone can be trafficked, but traffickers specifically
search for young women due to their vulnerability and
financial benefits

7. Why do youth “agree” to become
involved?
Foster Care/Residential Pimp/Trafficker
1. Feel they have no control;
can’t go where and when
they want to
2. Can’t have alcohol and/or
drugs
3. Can’t buy clothes or get hair
and nails done
4. Dislike living in a group
home; want to be with
family
1. Have control; get to go to
parties and stay out late
2. Trafficker will give me drugs
and alcohol
3. Lets me wear “grown up”
clothes and pays to get my
hair and nails done
4. Get to live in traffickers
house with other girls who
are like family

8. Indicators of Human Trafficking
A youth is considered “high risk” if they meet one
or more of the following criteria:
 Youth is pregnant/parenting
 Youth has severe emotional problems that if
not treated will place the children at severe
risk
 Youth has a developmental disability that
impairs the youth’s ability to case for
his/herself
Here are indicators that may help us identify when a youth may be
involved in Human Trafficking:
 History of running away, or currently a runaway
 Youth makes references to travelling to other cities while on run
 Youth makes references to being coerced into performing illegal
activities
 Youth makes references to having a pimp or “daddy”
 Youth has current signs of physical abuse and/or sexually
transmitted diseases
 Youth seems submissive or fearful
 Unexplainable appearance of expensive gifts, clothing,
manicures/pedicures, or other costly items
 Presence of an older significant other
 Withdrawal or lack of interest in previous activities of interest
 Tattoos or branding
 Possession of a cell phone
 Posts on social networking sites
 Youth was located in a hotel/motel or reports spending time in
one
 Youth has been isolated from sources of support and protection
 Youth makes references to sexual situations that are beyond age-
specific norms
 Youth engages in sexually provocative behaviors, is promiscuous
and/or has unprotected sex with multiple partners
 Youth makes references to terminology of the commercial sex
industry

9. Human Trafficking Awareness
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlKBeF3Zh00&
feature=youtu.be

10. How to Protect Our Youth
Youth Returns from Run Reason to Suspect
 Meet with youth to complete runaway
protocol and Life Span Interview, and
complete necessary phone calls
 Make a copy of the “Child Runaway from
Placement Protocol” and place in the
case manager’s box for further follow up
and documentation from case worker
 Place original copy of the “Child
Runaway from Placement” in the
designated area for the Milieu
Coordinator and filing
If there are reasons to suspect that the client
may be at risk for human trafficking, staff
should:
 Bring concerns to the treatment team
 The treatment team would review the
concerns and make an action plan on
how to move forward
 Case manager would report these
concerns to DCFS (Department of
Children’s and Family Services) case
worker in order to review the DCFS
Human Trafficking Protocol and further
steps that may need to be taken

11. Engaging with Victims
 Keep individual talking so victim feels comfortable
 Slow down if victim seems overwhelmed or provides a
disconnected story
 Don’t be embarrassed or anxious regarding sexual content
or street language
 Don’t expect them to see human trafficking as exploitive
 Apply sensitivity and attention to cultural backgrounds
 Instill a sense of hope, allowing them to feel that things
can get better
 Use language of the victim
 Understand and accept that victims are anxious and will
be resistant

12. Staying, Leaving, Relapse
 Stages of Change Model

13. Staying, Leaving, Relapse cont…
Staying vs. Leaving Relapse
 Stay:
 Trafficker shows they care
 Provides gifts, kind words,
affection, ideas of love
 Victim feels cared for and a
part of family
 Leave:
 Violence
 In debt
 No other options
 Fear of being detained
 Drugs
 Social exclusion and
discrimination
 Rejection by family
 Miss their pimp
 Believe their pimps will
change
 Pimp starts cycle of kindness

14. Healing/Preventing Relapse
Our Duty Prevention
 Prepare for crisis intervention
 Provide sense of physical and
emotional safety
 Ask open ended questions
 Normalize feelings
 Connect to resources
 Create sense of hope and
empowerment
 Give client a voice
 Educate youth and families
 Spread awareness
 Teach youth vocational skills
 Be aware of additional victims
involved. Traffickers involve
multiple victims
 Be Patient – Victims may need
multiple discussions over weeks
and months to obtain truthful
statements
 Provide constant, consistent
communication about the
information obtained from the
victim

15. Resources
 http://thenoproject.org/english/slavery/the-
traffickers/
 http://www.ungift.org/doc/knowledgehub/resource-
centre/IOM_SACTAP_South_Africa_10_Questions_ab
out_Human_Trafficking.pdf
 http://www.polarisproject.org/human-
trafficking/overview/the-traffickers