Sex trade involving children must be tackled, even in Ohio

The findings may not be as earth-shattering as the 800,000 people who are moved across international borders annually by human traffickers, or the 20,000 victims estimated to exist in the United States, but when one in three runaways in Ohio gone for two weeks or longer is at risk of being trafficked for sex, there is reason for concern.

And when it is estimated that more than 1,000 young people between the ages of 12 and 17 have been forced into the sex trade over the course of a year, action by state and local governments and social service agencies is demanded.

“This is clear evidence that we need to do more, much more, to protect our youth in Ohio,” said Attorney General Richard Cordray last week as he unveiled the “Report on the Prevalence of Human Trafficking in Ohio,” compiled by a special commission created last summer.

It is noteworthy that this is the first formal attempt to quantify the problem of human trafficking in the state. The 69-page report provides estimates of the number of individuals in Ohio who are being trafficked, as well as the number of those who could be vulnerable to traffickers.

The Greater Cincinnati Human Trafficking Report, which notes that 100,000 to 300,000 American youth are at high risk of being trafficked for sex, describes Ohio as a high supply, transit and destination state for victims.

New law

Last year, Gov. Ted Strickland signed the state’s first trafficking-in-persons law that opened the door for the formation of the study commission. Cordray presided over the first gathering of the panel last August.

Why should Ohioans care? Because such trade knows no bounds. Targets could be foreign-born residents in the state legally or illegally, domestic violence victims, runaways and homeless youth. Forced labor and sex trafficking are what awaits them.

In 2003, then President George W. Bush signed the U.S. Child Protect Act and offered this observation:

“The victims of sex trade see little life before they see the very worse of life; an underground of brutality and lonely fear. Those who create these victims and profit from their suffering must be severely punished.”

But punishment in Ohio has been anything but reflective of the seriousness of the crime. Indeed, the commission said in its report that the state’s response to sex trafficking is weak, first responders remain unaware and unprepared and services are inadequate.

Individuals who purchase the young are rarely prosecuted in a significant way, the report states. In addition, traffickers also suffer “minimal consequences.”

The attorney general and members of the commission must now take on the issue of deterrence. There is no doubt that tough laws and even tougher penalties will have a positive effect.