HUMAN SLAVERY STATISTICS – UNITED STATES
• The United States of America is principally a transit and destination country for trafficking in persons. The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency estimates that 50,000 people are trafficked into or transited through the U.S.A. annually as sex slaves, domestics, garment, and agricultural slaves.
• States with the greatest concentration of trafficked persons are New York, California, and Florida; Washington DC also has a large trafficked population.
• Between 100,000 and 300,000 thousand children in the US are at risk for sex trafficking each year.
• In the US, as many as 2.8 million children live on the streets, a third of whom are lured into prostitution within 48 hours of leaving home.
• Research conducted with Free the Slaves found documented cases of slavery in over 90 cities in the US.
• In the last two years, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) has discovered approximately one dozen major drop houses throughout Southern California. The agency is seeing an increasing number in the Inland Empire. In December, authorities found 25 illegal immigrants in a drop house near downtown Riverside.
Source: http://www.gchope.org/human-slavery-statistics.html, 2009

This Image was inspired from the real life story of a Restavèk named Bill Nathan as portrayed by E. Benjamin Skinner – “A Crime So Monstrous”.
Definition: A “Restavèk” is a Haitian Creole term for a child from a poor family who is handed over to another family to provide “domestic help,” in exchange for a better future. The vast majority of these children are blatantly denied their rights to education, adequate nutrition, rest and recreation1.
The following excerpt is the inspiration for the primary image:
…. Bill tried to speak but choked on tears instead. She kicked him to his knees. Then she handed him two rocks, one in either hand, and told him to hold his arms extended, and not to drop the rocks or she would kill him.
The martinet (small whip) first fell on his back. He held his tongue, and held on to the rocks. Then she beat him harder. As Bill screamed, she whipped him everywhere – his head, even his eyes. The other children watched in horror. After twenty minutes, Bill’s blood lay in pools on the cement floor. The rocks were still in his hands.
1 – Source: National Coalition for Haitian Rights – http://www.nchr.org/nchr/hrp/restavek/definition2.htm

Human Right’s Activist Dr. Kenneth B. Morris, Jr. descends from two of the most important names in American history: he is the great-great-great grandson of Frederick Douglass and the great-great grandson of Booker T. Washington. His life until the year 2007 could be described as distinguished yet decisively disengaged from his lineage until Providence called.
Today, Dr. Morris’ life path is driven by a mission to end human trafficking and all forms of servitude with a clear focus on the restoration of the dignity and well being of its victims. He could not have predicted that one day he would so fully embrace and be defined by the characteristics that so closely defined his famous ancestors.

“Jerry Gore – Sankofa”
Historian Jerry Gore is the great-great grandson of Addison White
(called Ohio’s most famous fugitive on the Underground Railroad).
He is Co-Founder of the National Underground Railroad Museum located in historic Maysville, KY.
Through Mr. Gore, we hear the voices of enslaved Africans who risked everything to achieve their freedom on the Underground Railroad. His presentations and Freedom Time Tours have impacted students from all over the world.
“Education is key to a better life and a better world if people are soundly educated in the fact,” says Mr. Gore.
“We try with all our heart and soul to have a clear understanding of history and relationships in history,
including life and social issues.”

HUMAN TRAFFICKING: THE FACTS
• An estimated 2.5 million people are in forced labor (including sexual exploitation) at any given time as a result of trafficking1
Of these:
o 1.4 million – 56% – are in Asia and the Pacific
o 250,000 – 10% – are in Latin America and the Caribbean
o 230,000 – 9.2% – are in the Middle East and Northern Africa
o 130,000 – 5.2% – are in sub-Saharan countries
o 270,000 – 10.8% – are in industrialized countries
o 200,000 – 8% – are in countries in transition2
• 161 countries are reported to be affected by human trafficking by being a source, transit or destination count3
• People are reported to be trafficked from 127 countries to be exploited in 137 countries, affecting every continent and every type of economy4
SOURCE(S)
1 International Labor Organization, Forced Labor Statistics Factsheet (2007)
2 International Labor Organization, Forced Labor Statistics Factsheet (2007)
3 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Trafficking in Persons: Global Patterns (Vienna, 2006)
4 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Trafficking in Persons: Global Patterns (Vienna, 2006)

DEFINITION: “Child Soldier” – A child soldier has been defined as a person under the age of 18 who directly or indirectly participates in an armed conflict as part of an armed force or group. While some children wield assault rifles, machetes, or rocket propelled grenades on the front lines, others are used in “combat support” roles as messengers, spies, cooks, mine clears, porters and sexual slaves. It is not uncommon for them to participate in killing and raping.

CHILD LABOR STATISTICS





Sources:
1,2 UNICEF global databases, 2011.
Based on DHS, MICS and other national surveys, 2000-2010.
3,4,5,6 www.unicef.org, www.ilo.org, www.crin.org

Debt bondage (also known as bonded labor) is probably the most common, but least known contemporary form of slavery today. Debt bondage affects many millions of men, women and children across the world. It occurs in a variety of sectors, including agriculture, logging, construction, domestic work, brick kilns and the textile and garment industry.
A person becomes a “bonded laborer” when their labor is demanded as a means of repayment for a loan, often for a very small amount such as the cost of medicine for a sick child. Once in debt, the person loses all control over their conditions of work and is forced to work long hours, often for seven days a week, for very little or no pay. The value of their work is invariably greater than the original sum of money borrowed. The debt becomes inflated through charges for food, transport and interest on loans, making it impossible to repay and trapping the worker in a cycle of debt. Entire families may be bonded, including children who work alongside their parents to help repay the debt. In some cases, the debt will be passed down through generations. Bonded laborers are often subjected to other forms of coercion including violence and restrictions on their freedom of movement

This image is a true story as reported by ABC Prime-time news1 – kidnapped from her driveway while still in her pajamas and forced into the sex trade for over 4 months – (Condensed).
One evening Debbie said she got a call from a casual friend, Bianca, who asked to stop by Debbie’s house. Wearing a pair of Sponge Bob pajamas, Debbie met Bianca who drove up in a Cadillac with two older men, After a few minutes of visiting; Bianca said they were going to leave.
“So I went and I started to go give her a hug,” Debbie told “Primetime.” “And that’s when she pushed me in the car.”
As they sped away from her house, Debbie said that one of the men told Bianca to tie her up and said he threatened to shoot Bianca if she didn’t comply. “She tied up my hands first, and then she put the tape over my mouth. And she put tape over my eyes,” Debbie said. “While she was putting tape on me, Matthew told me if I screamed or acted stupid, he’d shoot me.
Unbelievably, police say Debbie was kidnapped from her own driveway with her mother, Kersti, right inside. Her captors drove her around the streets of Phoenix for hours. Exhausted and confused, she was finally taken to an apartment 25 miles from her home. She said one of her captors put a gun to her head. “He goes, ‘If I was to shoot you right now, where would you want to be shot — in your head, in your back or in your chest?’” Debbie said. “And then I hear him start messing with his gun. And he counted to three and then he pulled the trigger. And then I was still alive. I opened my eyes, and I just saw him laughing.”
Debbie said she was then drugged by her captors and other men were brought into the room, where she was gang raped
SOURCE:
1 – http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1596778&page=1

SLAVERY
1. (Law) the state or condition of being a slave; a civil relationship whereby one person has absolute power over another and controls his life, liberty, and fortune
HUMAN TRAFFICKING
The definition on Human Trafficking consists of three core elements:
1) The action of trafficking which means the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons
2) The means of trafficking which includes threat of or use of force, deception, coercion, abuse of power or position of vulnerability
3) The purpose of trafficking which is always exploitation. In the words of the Trafficking Protocol, article 3 “exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labor or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs.
Source: UN Trafficking Protocol, 2000 http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/faqs.html#How_is_human_trafficking_different_to_migrant_smuggling