Biggest Sex Slavery Inquiry Fails to Net Single Trafficker...

....and biggest Herstorian inquiry of major media coverage of sex trafficking fails to find single article that incorporates a female perspective. Today's Guardian contained two articles concerning sex trafficking and sexual slavery in the UK. In these articles, Nick Davies reports that Operation Pentameter Two, the UK's biggest anti-trafficking operation to date, failed to find any traffickers.. Out of 406 arrests, 153 were released without charge or with a caution for a minor offense, 73 were charged with violating migration laws, 76 were convicted but for non-trafficking offenses. Only 96 people were arrested and held, and only 67 were charged. Of those 67 only 22 were prosecuted. In sum, only 15 traffickers were arrested and prosecuted as such. From these numbers Nick argues that the scale and nature of sex trafficking into the UK has been greatly exaggerated. Well this is just great! A feminist issue Herstorian can stop worrying about! Thanks, Nick!

Unfortunately, Nick's logic is as faulty as Jan Moir's (see 19 October). Davies reels off numbers but fails to give an adequate account of just how police investigations into sex trafficking is actually undertaken. Police forces frequently have little knowledge or understanding of the nuances of sex trafficking and thus can often fail to recognize a trafficker or a trafficked person. Police action on sex trafficking usually takes the form of raids on massage parlors or brothels, such as the Soho raids in 2003. In these raids anyone suspected of being trafficked (read: any foreign woman) is arrested and held in police detention. They are then interviewed by a police officer or a immigration officer to see if they have been trafficking. Is it really likely that a foreign-born woman, who may be illiterate or have very limited English, would be able to stand up and say "Hey I've been trafficked, yes I have! That's my trafficker right there!"?!?!? It is unlikely that a trafficked woman, who may have been raped, beaten, or otherwise abused, would be emotionally, mentally, financially or physically able to open up to a stranger in a uniform, especially one with the ability to deport her.

She may not even realize that she has experienced a rights violation punishable by law. Think about it. The line between smuggling and trafficking is blurry. Very rarely is a trafficked woman actually abducted in her home in the middle of the night and kept in chains. A woman may have may have decided to migrate voluntarily but was then captured, tricked or coerced in the migration process. Migrating is expensive and dangerous for disadvantaged women. Usually women rely on third-parties to aid the migration process (such as procuring visas, loaning money for transport). They arrive in the country of destination with "debts" in the tens of thousands and so are in effect held as indentured sex labour until their "debts" are paid off. The 2003 UN Protocol on the Trafficking of Persons recognizes situations such as this, where a person is coerced or tricked into migration or sex work, as trafficking. But is it likely that a trafficked woman would be up-to-date on the niceties of international legislation regarding human trafficking?

This has huge ramifications for the identification and prosecution of traffickers, which rely on victim testimony. If victims are unable or unwilling to report, identify, or testify against their traffickers, then it doesn't surprise Herstorian that only 15 traffickers have been prosecuted. This doesn't mean that the sex trafficking and slavery phenomenon is exaggerated. It means we don't have adequate means yet of addressing it.