Human Trafficking

Marisela GarciaWorkforce Professional Development Academy

Orlando, FLDecember 5, 2013

What is Human Trafficking?

• Form of modern-day slavery that involves the exploitation of persons for commercial sex or forced labor

• Often involves crossing an international border but does not require moving a victim

• Traffickers use force, fraud, or coercion to control their victims

Scope of the Problem

• Estimated 500,000 to 2 million people trafficked worldwide annually (70% of victims are female)

• Estimated 15,000 to 18,000 persons trafficked annually into the U.S.

• Approximately 27 million people held in slavery worldwide

Contributing Factors

• Pronounced international trends contribute to the rapid growth of trafficking:

• Increased ability by people to cross borders

• Increased poverty worldwide

• Result: Desperately poor people immigrate to seek work

Children are routinely enslaved in West Africa’s chocolate agribusiness

Asian women are increasingly trafficked in brothels around the world

South Asian domestic workers face slave-like conditions in the Middle East

Migrant farmworkers worldwide face harsh exploitation

It’s Here in the United States

It’s Here in Florida

• Florida ranks number three in the country for human trafficking cases (following New York and California)

• Florida has been the scene of both the largest U.S. sex trafficking and labor trafficking cases

A Lucrative Business

• Yields an estimated $31 billion in profits each year

• Unlike drugs and arms traffickers, human traffickers can continue to exploit their victims after initial point of sale

• Becoming a preferred business for criminal syndicates around the world

Difficult to Stop

• Trafficking is fueled by economically desperate victims and by market demands for cheap labor– Where there are labor-intensive industries, with little

governmental oversight, human trafficking will often exist

• Trafficking flourishes when end users can make money or save money through the exploitation of others

Activities For Which People Are Trafficked

• Prostitution• Exotic dancing• Agricultural work• Landscape work• Domestic work and

child care (“domestic servitude”)

• Factory work

• Commercial cleaning• Begging/street peddling• Restaurant work• Construction work• Carnival work• Hotel housekeeping• Criminal activities• Day labor

Traffickers Use Multiple Means to Control Their Victims

• Beatings, burnings, rapes, and starvation• Isolation• Psychological abuses• Drug or alcohol dependency• Document withholding• Debt bondage• Threats of deportation• Threats against the victim’s family or friends in his/her home

country

2011 Florida Strategic Plan

• Presented to Florida Legislature by FSU Center for the Advancement of Human Rights

• DEO and other state agencies involved

Key Findings

• Florida continues to have agricultural brothels where significant sex trafficking occurs

• But labor trafficking is even more prevalent than sex trafficking in Florida

• Key Florida Business Sectors for labor trafficking:1. The Agricultural Sector

2. The Tourism & Hospitality Sector

Florida Agricultural Brothels

Florida Agricultural Brothels

“The Work Station”

Tools of the Trade

Victim Belongings

Weapons

Agricultural Labor Trafficking in Florida

Florida Orange Groves: For Tourists

Florida Orange Groves: for Migrant Workers

2001 Ramos Case

• Field slavery operation near Lake Placid, FL • Migrant workers transported from Arizona and held

in debt bondage – 700+ male victims• Ramos brothers were former farmworkers • Victims held in substandard

housing and worked 10+ hours a day

• Four farm workers escape with help of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW)

The Complicity of Businesses

• Federal judge presiding over the Ramos case declared that responsibility for the crime clearly extended to the corporate level of the Florida agricultural industry

• But noted that current law requiring that prosecutors show actual knowledge on the part of criminal perpetrators limited him to sentencing only the subcontractors (the Ramos brothers)

2005 Evans Case

• Homeless African American men & women recruited from Florida shelters for exploitation on potato & cabbage farms near Palatka

• “Company Store” model used to drive up worker debts

• Workers were paid with alcohol & crack cocaine

2005 Evans Case

2005 Evans Case

Palatka Investigation

• Investigation begins with Environmental Protection Agency discovery of human feces in the St. John River

• Sub-contractor Ronald Evans prosecuted, though not the farm employers

• 30 year criminal sentence included drug trafficking, environmental violations, and sale of unlicensed cigarettes

2008 Navarette Case

2008 Navarette Case

• Navarette family recruits Mexican and Guatemalan pickers to work their tomato fields in Immokalee

• Navarettes create a debtor system by plying the men with beer and drugs, adding these costs to their room & board

• Workers required to perform 10 hour work days and slashed with knives or tied to posts if they refused

2008 Navarette Case

• Workers locked each night in a truck boxcar

2008 Navarette Case

• Cesar Navarette the recruiter and brother Giovanni the enforcer

• Six members of the Navarette family ultimately convicted of human trafficking, Social Security fraud, and harboring undocumented foreign nationals for private gain

• Also required to pay $240,000 in restitution to the victims

CIW Modern Slavery Museum

Bull’s Hit Ranch & Farm

• Hastings potato grower settles human trafficking lawsuit (October 25, 2012)

Bull’s Hit Ranch & Farm

• Bull’s-Hit Ranch & Farm accused of mistreating African-American homeless men (including military veterans)

• Claim that Farm’s sub-contractor Ronald Uzzle hired men from Jacksonville homeless shelters taking advantage of the workers’ drug dependence

• Workers then held in overcrowded camp, plied with drugs, and had their wages garnered by Uzzle

Bull’s Hit Ranch & Farm

• Victims awarded back pay• Owner of Bulls-hit Ranch Thomas R. Lee agrees to

pay workers directly in the future• Investigation reveals that Ranch had been sued on

exact same grounds in 2004

Lawsuit Against Ronald Uzzle Continues

Potential Indicators of Labor Trafficking

• Signs of Physical Control or Abuse• One person steps forward to try to talk to an

investigator or government official on behalf of an entire group

• Traffickers may limit victims’ contact with the public or with customers

Potential Indicators of Labor Trafficking

• Victims often live in the location where they work

• Victims may lack personal items or forms of identification

• H-2A workers not working where their visa stipulates

Potential Indicators of Labor Trafficking

• Victims may lack: Personal items/possessions Cell phones, calling cards, etc. Private space Financial records Transportation Knowledge about how to get around in a community

Labor Camp/Sweatshop Indicators

• Security intended to keep victims confined Barbed wire Bars or outside locks on windows & doors Self-contained camps Handlers, guards, and/or guard dogs

• Victims only allowed to shop at “company store”

Labor Camp/Sweatshop Indicators

Human Trafficking Hotline Numbers

• National Hotline (24/7)1-888-373-7888

• Florida Abuse Hotline1-800-96-ABUSE (1-800-962-2873)

• Florida Farmworker Helpline1-800-633-3572

For More Information

Marisela GarciaSenior Monitor Advocate

Bureau of One-Stop and Program SupportDepartment of Economic Opportunity

(850) 921-3207Marisela.Garcia@deo.myflorida.com