Guam learns more about human trafficking issues

Written by BY GERALDINE CASTILLO | VARIETY NEWS STAFF Friday, 25 Jan 2013 03:00am

MODERN-DAY slavery exists in the many forms of human trafficking, and Guam is learning to tackle this issue more aggressively through training from the National Association of Attorneys General. Chris Toth, NAAG deputy director and director of the NAAG Training Research Institute, is heading an 18-man delegation from the association, currently on Guam to conduct intensive comprehensive training with various local law enforcement agencies and officials this week.

Yesterdays conference held at the Hyatt Regency was centered on human trafficking. The four-day training will conclude today. According to Toth, human trafficking is an increasing problem that involves the exploitation of individuals. People dont realize its essentially modern-day human slavery, he said. It occurs in a couple of different ways its both labor trafficking but increasingly more sex trafficking. Coercion As defined by the U.S. Department of State in its 2012 Trafficking in Persons Report, human trafficking or trafficking in persons are umbrella terms for the act of recruiting, harboring, transporting, providing, or obtaining a person for compelled labor or commercial sex acts through the use of force, fraud, or coercion. Whether its sexual exploitation, the prostitution of minors, debt bondage, or forced labor, human trafficking comes in many guises. It takes all shapes and forms, Toth said. And basically its a crime of exploitation of the weak and vulnerable. Although the poor or uneducated are the typical targets of human trafficking, Toth said even the not-so-poor fall victims to this crime. Many young women in particular and sometimes young men are blackmailed into becoming sex slaves, he said. So as one of our instructors pointed out, its really in many ways a civil rights issue of the 21st century. Toth credited Attorney General Leonardo Rapadas who was instrumental in seeking out the training. Toth expressed confidence that investigators and prosecutors in Guam both at the federal and local level are getting as much training as possible in fighting the problem.

1/2

Guam learns more about human trafficking issues

Written by BY GERALDINE CASTILLO | VARIETY NEWS STAFF Friday, 25 Jan 2013 03:00am

Reaching out With the training being provided, Rapadas hopes to be able to reach out to other institutions that are at the front end of human trafficking investigations, such as the medical community who would be a valuable resource, or anyone else who comes in contact with human trafficking besides law enforcement agencies. If we get more of those people educated in human trafficking, the dangers and the signs and there are subtle signs that you can look for I think that radar scope is going to widen, Rapadas said. Were going to catch more. It may be happening, but again with the education were provided, well catch them all.

2/2