Is there human trafficking in Ohio?

Unfortunately, there is. We're finding that most women involved in street prostitution are forced into it by pimps that collect the profit and threaten their lives if they try to escape. If you have street prostitution in your hometown, chances are, there's sex trafficking in your streets.

While most sex trafficking victims in the United States are American citizens, the majority of labor trafficking victims are immigrants. In Ohio and across the country, labor trafficking victims are enslaved on agricultural labor camps, in restaurants, nail salons, and other businesses. Most labor trafficking victims in the United States are held in domestic servitude and forced to work as maids or nannies in American homes with no pay, are threatened with deportation if they attempt to escape, and are held in slavery through physical and sexual abuse.
Here's some data that has been collected on Ohio's human trafficking problem:


The Ohio Attorney General's Trafficking in Person Study Commission reported in February 2010:

• 2,879 Ohio children are at-risk to be victimized by sex traffickers
• 1,078 Ohio children are currently being trafficking in the sex trade
• 3,437 foreign-born people are at-risk to be victimized by human traffickers in Ohio
• 783 foreign-born people are currently being trafficked in Ohio
• 6,316 total people in Ohio are at-risk to be victimized by human traffickers, in either labor or sex trafficking
• 1,861 total people in Ohio are currently being victimized by human traffickers, in either labor or sex trafficking
• Toledo is currently number four in the nation in terms of the number of arrests, investigations, and rescues of domestic minor sex trafficking victims among U.S. cities (Northwest Ohio Innocence Lost Task Force, 2009). The top three cities are Miami, Portland, and Las Vegas. Given that Toledo and Lucas County have a much less concentrated population than these 3 cities, this area can be considered to lead the nation for the number of traffickers produced adn the number of victims recruited into the sex trade per capita (based on U.S. Census, 2008 estimates).
• http://www.ohioattorneygeneral.gov/TraffickingReport
  

Ohio's Human Trafficking Problem in the News

Belmont and Harrison County -9/10: WFRF-TV reports that the mother from Cadiz charged with compelling prostitution of children will be tried under federal law.  Because she sold the children in multiple counties and states, local authorities handed the case to the federal authorities “because we want to seek the harshest penalties possible.”

Chillicothe – 10/09:  The Columbus Dispatch reports that Craig Corey, Robert Harris, Richard Johnson, and Jacob Tyler (all men from Chillicothe) are charged with using force and threats to coerce Ohio women and under-age girls into prostitution in Maryland.  A Columbus Dispatch editorial argues that federal agents only got involved because a minor had been taken across state lines for prostitution.  A state law making human trafficking a felony would help Ohio address cases that don’t cross state lines.

Toledo and Cleveland - 2/09:  As part of its “Operation Cross Country”, the FBI freed 45 child sex trafficking victims across the country. Two cities included in the operation were Toledo and Cleveland.

Columbus -2008/09:  Central Ohio Rescue & Restore assisted immigrants who had been trafficked in an ethnic restaurant, where they were being forced to work without pay and were not allowed to leave the building.

Columbus -9/08: The Columbus Dispatch reports that William Green and Bridgette Baugh were arrested and charged with transporting women across state lines to engage in prostitution.  One of the women being transported told officials that her mother had been selling her to Green for sex since she was 14 years old.  Green told an undercover officer that he could supply underage girls—as young as 6 years old for sex.  Columbus police detective Ken Lawson said the only chance for charging the two with a human trafficking felony was to file federal charges, since here in Ohio such a law has “never made it out of committee.”  Lawson said that because of this deficiency, trafficking cases sometimes wind up being prosecuted under less-stringent laws such as solicitation.

Geauga County -8/08: Sheriff deputies, Chester Township police and the county prosecutor raided the Silver Springs Spa, which was operating as a brothel.  Four Korean women were taken from the brothel to the Geauga County Safety Center.

Bowling Green -5/07: The Toledo Blade reports that Seybert Williams Jr. of Northwood was arrested and charged for compelling prostitution of a minor.   The minor was 13 years old, a drug-addicted runaway he paid for sex in 2005 and 2006.

Miamisburg -2007:  The New York Times reports that a young man from Miamisburg unknowingly joined a traveling magazine-selling crew that was really a labor trafficking operation.  The manager refused to pay him and beat some of the workers.  The young man was forced to work 10 – 14 hours a day for 6 months until the manager finally dropped him off 1,000 miles from home with $17.

Hamilton County-2/06: Edward McGhee was found guilty of two counts each of compelling prostitution and unlawful sexual conduct with a minor.  He sold a 15-year-old girl to men for sex, telling them she was 19 while knowing she was 15.

Toledo -2/06:  The Toledo Blade reports that a 13-year old girl from Adrian, taken on a road trip by her 19-year-old boyfriend under the farce of a 14^th birthday party celebration, was abandoned by her boyfriend with former Toledoan Clarence Brown and Holly Hollis, who raped her and forced her to have sex with men for money at Indiana truck stops.  She was rescued by trucker Peggy Jones, who said the teen climbed into her truck and begged, “Just go! Go!”  The girl is now home safe again with her family and both Brown and Hollis have been convicted of kidnapping and sex trafficking.

Licking County-4/05: The Columbus Dispatch reports that Joseph Saunders, Thomas Coss, Carly Bly, Trudy Smith, and Andrew Cramer were indicted on various charges including compelling prostitution, rape, and illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material or performance for their exploitation of a 13-year-old girl.

Cleveland -4/03: The Plain Dealer reports that a 17-year-old girl was abducted from a downtown Cleveland street at gunpoint and taken to Detroit, where her captors forced her and other girls to have sex with johns and dance nude in underground clubs.  Her eventual escape and help from a mall-security guard led to the downfall of a four-state prostitution ring and its leader, Henry Davis.