Kirkland

Haylea Kirkland
Professor Elizabeth Caruso
UWRT 1103
15 November 2016
Defense Paper: Human Trafficking
When most Americans think about human trafficking, they typically picture some thirdworld country overseas, or a scene from Taken. What many people fail to realize is that human
trafficking is a major problem here in the United States even today. The problem has only gotten
worse as investigators for the Department of Homeland Security are seeing a 50 percent spike
in their caseload according to a special agent for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcements
Homeland Security Investigations team (Sullivan 1). In 2013, the team saw more than 800
traffickers convicted, and only saw 144 convictions just three years earlier (Sullivan 1).
According to Whitni Wertz, a member of the local human trafficking task force, North Carolina
currently ranks in the top ten for reported cases of trafficking nationally with Charlotte ranking
as the number one city in the state. It is alarming to learn that North Carolina is ranked
anywhere near the top ten in the country, however I find it even more alarming that Charlotte is
ranked number one in the state.
The vast majority of Charlotteans are oblivious to the modern day slavery that surrounds
them. My goal is to get the word out about human trafficking in Charlotte and to raise awareness
about the disturbing occurrence of trafficking. To accomplish this, I created a poster for bus
stops in the Uptown area. Public transportation in Charlotte is used considerably. In 2011, the
Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS) was ranked 48 out of the top 50 largest transit agencies
when ranked by unlinked passenger trips and passenger miles according to the 2013 Public

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Transportation Fact Book (8). By putting a poster in these bus stops, I will be able to
successfully reach my target audience of adults, particularly young adults, in the Uptown area.
The reason I chose to target Uptown Charlotte is because it is a rapidly growing area. In addition
to reaching a local population, the poster will also extend to reach many commuters from the
surrounding cities such as Matthews and Mint Hill who work in Uptown. The poster is black
and white with shades of gray. I included two eye-catching statistics on the poster as well to
minimize the appearance of text while still being able to accomplish my goal of raising
awareness. I also put key words in red to focus the viewers attention to specific places, as well
as include a website for people to visit in order to learn more about human trafficking.
North Carolina has been a hotspot for trafficking because of factors such as the states
location on the Eastern seaboard, the number of military installations and the number of ports
located on the coastal region, as well as the states large agricultural economy (Jayson 4). The
number of major interstate highways in North Carolina also plays a role in the states high
concentration of trafficking, for example the intersection of I-77 and I-85 in Charlotte. In
addition, Charlotte is the home to several large venues such as the Bank of America Stadium, the
Charlotte Motor Speedway, and the Charlotte Douglas International Airport. These venues are
especially attractive to perpetrators due to the high volume of people, particularly tourists, who
visit these locations. The Charlotte Douglas International Airport also provides offenders with
quick access to transport victims throughout the world, making them more difficult to locate.
In my poster I wanted to specifically include a statistic about children. Think about it: if
you were to see two separate statistics dealing with victims in human trafficking, one focusing on
adults and the other focusing on children, which would you find more alarming? In the United
States, there are approximately 200,000 U.S. children at high risk for being sold into slavery

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(Transforming Hope Ministries, 2013). Despite the fact that most of the research and resources
for trafficking victims have been directed towards adults rather than children, researchers agree
that there is a growing number of sexually exploited and trafficking children in the United States
(Fong and Cardoso 1). There is no official estimate of the exact number of trafficking victims
because there is a massive dark figure of crime, making approximations problematic. The dark
figure of crime is the group of unreported crimes. The reason there is such a high dark figure is
because many victims are often fearful of their captors due to various forms of physical and
psychological abuse. Victims also do not trust the police and typically do not know where to
turn for help (Wake People Up 2). Polaris estimates that the total number of victims nationally
reaches into the hundreds of thousands when estimates of both adults and minors and sex
trafficking and labor trafficking are aggregated (1). The 2013 Trafficking in Persons report
estimates that more than 26 million individuals are enslaved worldwide through various forms of
human trafficking (U.S. Department of State, 2013b). The same report also states that less than
one percent, roughly 40,000 victims, have been identified in that same year. According to the
National Human Trafficking Resource Center, there have been 140 cases reported this year in
North Carolina alone, and over 470 calls made to the National Human Trafficking Hotline (1).
Despite this, the full extent of trafficking within the state is still widely unknown.
As stated before, the main focus of my product is to raise awareness and fuel, if not
spark, the conversation about trafficking within the Charlotte community. As people go about
their daily activities, I hope they remember my poster and keep an eye out for potential victims
while also being careful to avoid putting themselves in a possible situation where they could be
victimized. About one-third of the handful of slaves freed in the United States each year come to

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liberty because an average person sees something they just cannot ignore (Bales and Soodalter
4).

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Works Cited
Original Sources:
15 Ways You Can Help Fight Human Trafficking. U.S. Department of State, 2016,
www.state.gov/j/tip/id/help/
Human Trafficking Awareness Training: TIP 101. U.S. Department of State, 2016,
www.state.gov/j/tip/training/index.htm
Alvarez, Priscilla. When Sex Trafficking Goes Unnoticed in America. The Atlantic, 23 Feb.
2016, www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/02/how-sex-trafficking-goes-unnoticedin-america/470166/
Harper, Kathleen. Exploring the hidden world of human trafficking in our own backyard. Elon
University, Center for Writing Excellence, www.elon.edu/eweb/academics/writing_excellence/contest/Contest%20Entry%20Harper
%20Journalism.xhtml
National Human Trafficking Resource Center. 2015 NHTRC Annual Report. NHTRC, Polaris,
Feb. 2016, traffickingresourcecenter.org/resources/2015-nhtrc-annual-report
National Human Trafficking Resource Center. North Carolina Statistics. NHTRC, Polaris, 30
Sept. 2016, traffickingresourcecenter.org/state/north-carolina
The Conversation. Popular movies are spreading misinformation about the reality of human
trafficking. Raw Story, 20 Jan. 2016, www.rawstory.com/2016/01/popular-movies-arespreading-misinformation-about-the-reality-of-human-trafficking/
Vandergriff, Caroline. Study: 110 Reported Cases of Human Trafficking in NC in 2015. Timer
Warner Cable, Charter Communications, 28 Jan. 2016,

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www.twcnews.com/nc/charlotte/news/2016/01/28/study--110-reported-cases-of-humantrafficking-in-nc-in-2015.html

New Sources:
11 Facts About Human Trafficking. Do Something, 2016, www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11facts-about-human-trafficking
The Facts. Polaris, Charity Navigator, 2016, polarisproject.org/facts
Why Dont They Just Run Away?. Wake People Up, Grounded Group, 2010,
www.wakepeopleup.com/why-dont-they-just-run-away/
American Public Transportation Association. Table 3. 2013 Public Transportation Fact Book,
64th ed. Washington, DC, Oct. 2013.
www.apta.com/resources/statistics/Documents/FactBook/2013-APTA-Fact-Book.pdf
Bales, Kevin, and Ron Soodalter. The Slave Next Door: Human Trafficking in America Today.
University of California Press, 2009. Google Books, books.google.com/books?
hl=en&lr=&id=J936zQHE44EC&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=human+trafficking+in+north+ca
rolina&ots=MooJ1ndK0D&sig=gSsGBs3qsiivojr4Dg9MwHy4bo#v=onepage&q&f=false
Fong, Rowena, and Jodi Berger Cardoso. Child human trafficking victims: Challenges for the
child welfare system. Evaluation and Program Planning, Vol. 33, The University of
Texas at Austin, 17 July 2009,
www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0149718909000640
Jayson, Karen G.. Introduction. Human Trafficking in North Carolina: Human Beings as a
Commodity, N.C. Governors Crime Commission Criminal Justice Analysis Center, 2

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Oct. 2013,

www.nccrimecontrol.org/div/GCC/pubs/Human_Trafficking_North_Carolina_2013.pdf
Sullivan, Karen. Human trafficking more likely as Charlotte region grows, authorities say The
Charlotte Observer, 11 Jan. 2016,
www.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/crime/article54153290.html
Transforming Hope Ministries. Statistics. Transforming Hope, Story Driven Media Group,
2013, www.transforminghopeministries.org/human-trafficking