No matter how it is defined, human trafficking is slavery. Even though the United Nations and all but two countries have outlawed slavery, more people are held as slaves today than at any other time in human history. Although the U.S. Supreme Court properly stated that slavery as a legal national phenomenon ended in the United States after the Civil War, today slavery flourishes as an illegal global epidemic. Human trafficking is second in size only to drug trafficking as a worldwide criminal enterprise. Every year traffickers move approximately 600,000 to 800,000 men, women, and children across international borders to be enslaved and exploited. Millions of victims are trafficked within national borders including thousands within the United States. Although willing private actors and corrupt authorities 14 facilitate trafficking, the main culprits are organized crime syndicates, mafias, gangs, unaffiliated individuals, and pimps. Whether kidnapped, deceived, or sold, trafficking victims are forced to work long hours in the commercial sex industry, agriculture, sweatshops, domestic servitude, restaurants, and hotels, among other types of labor. It is time to transform the Illinois Trafficking Law from a well-crafted and good-intentioned law to a safe-haven for modern-day slaves and a hammer against their masters.
Loyola University Chicago Law Journal, Vol.38, N°4 |
