Sex trafficking violates women and children’s basic human rights, including the right to be free from slavery and slavery-like practices; the right to equal protection under the law; the right to be free from discrimination based on race, nationality, and gender; and the rights to life, security of person and freedom from torture. Governments also violate trafficked persons’ rights when they fail to prevent sex trafficking, prosecute perpetrators or provide trafficked persons with effective remedies for these violations, such as access to courts and legal immigration status.
Locally, The Advocates is extremely proud of our work, together with the statewide Human Trafficking Task Force, to strengthen Minnesota’s state human trafficking laws. The State of Minnesota’s Human Trafficking Task Force endorsed our proposed legislation, and it will strengthen our law to better protect girls from being sold for sex. This ‘Safe Harbors’ bill would make changes to our laws to more clearly emphasize the state’s obligation to provide services and assistance to children who are sexually exploited, rather than label them as criminal prostitutes when they are purchased for sexual services.
In addition to our legislative work, The Advocates is currently writing the Sex Trafficking in Minnesota: Prosecutors Training Manual. This will be a manual for prosecutors to use to more effectively protect victims of sex trafficking cases and hold traffickers accountable for their crimes against women and girls under Minnesota law. This project is a one-year, two-phase project. The first phase, which involves creating the training manual and curriculum, is currently underway. In the second phase of the project, we will implement the curriculum with two day-long trainings this spring, one in the Twin Cities and one in Duluth.
Our current legislative work and prosecutors sex trafficking manual development are projects that build on our work over the years in Minnesota to protect women and girls from being sold for sex. In 2007, The Advocates’ Women’s Program was selected by the Minnesota Department of Public Safety’s Office of Justice Programs to conduct a human sex trafficking needs assessment for the state. The assessment, requested by the Minnesota Trafficking Task Force, was undertaken using the documentation and fact-finding techniques we developed in our overseas work and have adapted through our local work to analyze the services available to and the barriers faced by trafficked persons when seeking safety and support.
The report Sex Trafficking Needs Assessment for the State of Minnesota, published in September 2008, examines the government response to this issue at the local, state, tribal and federal levels; identifies facilities and services currently available to trafficking victims in Minnesota; assesses their effectiveness; and makes recommendations for coordinating services to better meet the needs of sex trafficking victims statewide.
Click here for the full report. Click here for the Executive Summary.
As a follow-up to the recommendations, The Advocates worked with the statewide Minnesota Trafficking Task Force to draft a bill to strengthen Minnesota's sex trafficking law to provide a stronger deterrent for those who sell human beings for sex and a stronger tool for those enforcing the law. The Minnesota Legislature unanimously passed and the governor signed the “Bill for an Act to Combat Trafficking in Minnesota” into law on May 21, 2009.
The amendments to Minnesota’s sex trafficking law will enable law enforcement and prosecutors to better hold the perpetrators of this grave human rights violation accountable. Specifically, the amendments to the law:
As a whole, the amendments send a strong message that Minnesota will not tolerate sexual slavery and involuntary servitude and that the perpetrators of such acts will be held accountable.
The Advocates' Women's Human Rights Program does education and outreach presentations on sex trafficking in Minnesota. Examples of such presentations and trainings include trainings for police, prosecutors and judges, as well as presentations and trainings for a variety of community groups and universities. If you are interested in having The Advocates present on this topic or have additional questions, please complete the Speaker's Request form here.
For information on a new approach by county attorneys to protecting children from sexual exploitation, click here.
If you need assistance in developing talking points for public policy discussions about combating sex trafficking in Minnesota, please contact the Women’s Program at The Advocates for Human Rights.