Our blog has moved to: force4compassion.tumblr.com

Please follow us at force4compassion.tumblr.com/ 
Thank you.

ICE most wanted fugitive arrested at JFK on human trafficking charges

Extorted more than $1 million in earnings from victims

DETROIT – Special agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) arrested today one of ICE's top ten fugitives at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York.
Veniamin Gonikman, 55, was charged in Detroit in 2005 in a 22-count indictment with trafficking in persons, forced labor, alien smuggling, money laundering, extortion collection and conspiracy, among other charges. He absconded from the United States before being formally charged.
Gonikman, a U.S. citizen, was arrested in Ukraine yesterday, before being deported to the United States. HSI special agents assigned to ICE's attaché office in Germany coordinated Gonikman's arrest and deportation with Ukrainian officials.
According to court records, he came to the attention of HSI special agents in Detroit in 2005 when one of his victims escaped and agents later confirmed he was operating a company called "Beauty Search, Inc.," in metro Detroit.
The indictment alleges that Gonikman, along with his co-conspirators, formed and operated Beauty Search as a corporate cover for a human trafficking operation which smuggled and harbored Eastern European women in the United States. The women were exploited and abused by forcing them - through threats, coercion and isolation - to work as exotic dancers for the economic benefit of the Beauty Search partners.
The women primarily staffed strip clubs in Detroit, where it is alleged they were forced to work 12 hours a day and have all of the proceeds extorted by Gonikman and his associates. The indictment and other court papers allege that the women gave the co-conspirators more than $1 million of their earnings.
In an effort to highlight the global threat of human trafficking, one of the conspiracy's victims testified before the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary in 2007 about her treatment at the hands of the Beauty Search partners.
"They forced me to work six days a week for twelve hours a day," she said. "I could not refuse to go to work or I would be beaten. I had to hand over all of my money. I was often yelled at for not making enough money or had a gun put to my face. Every week I handed over around $3000 to $4000. I was their slave."
Gonikman will make an initial appearance tomorrow in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. He is scheduled to be extradited to the Eastern District of Michigan at a later date to face the current charges.
"This arrest is a potent example of ICE's unyielding resolve to bring human traffickers to justice," said ICE Director John Morton. "Victims in forced labor cases are particularly vulnerable targets who are lured with promises of employment and stable lives and then end up in abusive and deplorable situations."
Gonikman’s associates including his son Aleksandr Maksimenko, Duay Joseph Jado, Evgeniy Prokopenko and Michail Aronovo were previously convicted and sentenced on similar charges. They are currently serving prison sentences ranging from seven to 14 years.
Three other defendants in this case were also convicted.
Gonikman, like all defendants, is presumed innocent until proven guilty. If convicted, he faces a maximum of 20 years in federal prison, plus potential fines and restitution.

Photo of Veniamin Gonikman

A Trafficking Survivor's Plea to Super Bowl Hosts and NFL

A.H. is an American survivor of human trafficking speaking out on behalf of American children being abused.  A.H. was trafficked to Dallas/Ft. Worth and forced into prostitution when she was just a teen. Like many other girls, she was beaten, raped, and enslaved not far from Dallas Cowboys stadium, where the 2011 Super Bowl will be held.  She has written a letter to the 2011 Super Bowl Host Committee and the NFL, asking them to endorse the I’m Not Buying It campaign. 

Here's A.H.'s letter, in full:

Dear Super Bowl Host Committee & National Football League,

My name is A.H. and I’m a survivor of sex trafficking. I’m not a big football fan, but I’ll never forget my first trip to Dallas/Fort Worth several years ago. It was 2006 when I was dragged there against my will by a pimp. I was forced to dance, strip and sell sex (along with five other young girls) for over a month while he pocketed the cash ($1,000-$3,000/night from each girl) and planned our next gig. I was trapped in a life I never wanted without any hope of escape.

You might be shocked to know that I come from an upstanding, supportive and loving family. I’ve been an excellent student my whole life, earning a scholarship to college. I had dreams, ambitions and the courage to make them happen. Everything changed the day I met the man who would later become my pimp. He was intelligent, attractive and seemed to genuinely care about me. When I lost my scholarship due to an injury, he offered to help me and I believed he would. As soon as I realized what he had in mind, I tried to leave. He grabbed me by the neck, threw me down and almost choked the life out of me. When he threatened to hurt my family if I didn’t cooperate, I knew I was trapped.

This nightmare was my life for over a year. During that time, we traveled to several states where I was sold at nightclubs, bars, and parties -- fulfilling a demand for sex nationwide. He was always there, always watching. If I refused to work, I was beaten and tortured.

We spent an entire month in Dallas/Fort Worth, where my pimp said the “real money” was. We were all young (some as young as 14-years-old) and that’s what the men wanted. No one asked if we were being forced to work, or if we enjoyed it. No one cared. While we were being sold for sex every night, our pimp was recruiting other local girls – from the Galleria, the clubs, concerts, and even McDonald’s.

I lived in fear every day, hoping I’d survive to see the next. It wasn’t until I heard him loading his gun to kill me that I finally mustered the courage to escape. Today, I’m a survivor. I share my story with you in the hopes that you’ll realize sex trafficking is real. It happens to young girls across America every day – girls as young as 13. With the Super Bowl quickly approaching, you have a choice to help stop it. Dallas/Fort Worth will soon become the nation’s biggest party – and every pimp’s center for business.

Please join me, Dallas Cowboy Jay Ratliff, and 65,000+ fans who’ve signed the Change.org petition in taking a stand against the exploitation of women and children during the Super Bowl. Every victim deserves the chance to become a survivor. And every young girl deserves to be protected and live a life free from slavery and exploitation.

I’m asking you to endorse the I’m Not Buying It campaign. By placing posters and billboards in and around the stadium you can deter men from engaging in the commercial sex market and save the lives of countless victims. You can make a difference – please, what would you do if it was your daughter?

Thank you,

A.H., Survivor of Sex Trafficking

Please log on and sign the petition and help protect our children.

petitions/view/ask_the_super_bowl_host_committee_to_stand_up_protect_children

Egypt

In Egypt, forum highlights the problem of human trafficking

© UNICEF/NYHQ2010-2471/Kamber

A girl carries a baby in the Marché Forum in Adjamé, a poor quarter in the city of Abidjan. The Marché Forum is one of the biggest markets in Abidjan, where hundreds of children work, selling produce or carrying customers’ goods.

By Emily Meehan

NEW YORK, USA, 30 December 2010 - UNICEF Child Protection Chief Susan Bissell, Egypt Representative Philippe Duamelle and Regional Goodwill Ambassador Mahmoud Kabil joined 300 business and civil society leaders and celebrities at a forum in Luxor, Egypt, earlier this December, to highlight the scourge of human trafficking and consider recommendations on how to prevent the practice.

“Trafficking of children is a grave violation of their rights, robbing them of their childhood, their well-being and the opportunity to reach their full potential,” said Susan Bissell. “No country is untouched by human trafficking as a source, transit point or destination.”

The majority of trafficking victims are women and children. Sexual exploitation is the most commonly identified form of trafficking in persons - 79 per cent - followed by forced labour. An estimated 2.5 million people are currently victims of human trafficking, a $32 billion a year global enterprise.

Trafficking remains a reality

Egyptian First Lady Suzanne Mubarak  acknowledged in a speech that Egypt is a source of trafficked individuals and a destination point. Mrs. Mubarak’s advocacy campaign, End Human Trafficking Now!, co-organized the Luxor Forum with the United Nations Global Initiative to Fight Human Trafficking.

Egypt's tens of the thousands of street children are often forced into begging and face sexual exploitation, explained Mrs. Mubarak. Girls in rural villages are often compelled to leave school at an early age to get married. While Egypt ‘s Child Law has recently been amended, raising the age of marriage for girls to eighteen, poor families frequently falsify documents, forcing their underage daughters to marry older men from oil rich Gulf states. Mrs. Mubarak vowed that Egypt would step up efforts to ensure that the law is enforced and to bring perpetrators to justice.

© UNICEF/NYHQ2009-2579/Noorani

A young woman hides her face in Proshanti, a shelter managed by the Bangladesh National Women Lawyers’ Association (BNWLA) in Dhaka, the capital. She was married at 14 years old, but her husband abandoned her when she became pregnant.

Other speakers at the conference included actor and anti-trafficking philanthropist Ashton Kutcher, Princess Mathilde of Belgium, and CNN anchor Jim Clancy. As the forum closed, the BBC produced an episode of the program, “The World Debate”  on the topic of ending human trafficking. UNICEF’s Susan Bissell participated in the filmed discussion.

Preventing exploitation

Protecting children from this form of enslavement begins with prevention - reducing the vulnerabilities that make children and families susceptible to traffickers. To this end, UNICEF works to prevent and respond to child trafficking around the world. In the vicinity of North Africa and the Middle East, one initiative is to end trafficking of expatriate children for use as camel jockeys on the Arabian Peninsula.

Camel racing is a tradition whose commercialisation, in the 1970s, spurred the use and abuse of young expatriate children as camel jockeys. Many of these children have been sent with agents from Sudan, Mauritania, Bangladesh and Pakistan with permission from parents who hoped they could earn a livelihood. 

© UNICEF/NYHQ2009-2203/Kamber

Ibrahim Cisse, 13, works and lives at a port in Conakry, the capital. At the port, he and other children load boats, sell goods at the market or wash dishes at food stalls. They are paid only in food. Most are orphans trafficked from Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone.

UNICEF has been working together with the government of the United Arab Emirates to put in place policies to repatriate and reintegrate these children back in their homes and to prevent such trafficking in the future.

Reversing the trend

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon sent a message to the Luxor Forum that the crime of trafficking is no longer being ignored by the international community.

This year the UN General Assembly launched a Global Plan of Action to Combat Trafficking in Persons, and established the UN Voluntary Trust Fund for Victims of Trafficking in Persons, which funds humanitarian, legal and financial aid to human trafficking victims.

"I implore businesses, civil society and each and every person to pledge their support for the Trust Fund,” said Yuri Fedetov, UN Office of Drugs and Crime Executive Director. “The special role that the business community can play in the Fund is one where I would particularly like to hear your views.”

National Human Trafficking Awareness Day

Today is National Human Trafficking Awareness Day...

Please join our partners in this fight at change.org and sign a petition that asks President Obama to reauthorize Trafficking Victims Protection Act.

http://bit.ly/eRcY8A

Tell the President & Congress to Protect Funding & Extend Critical Anti-Trafficking Legislation | Ch

www.change.org

This year, the Administration and Congress have the opportunity to make historic bipartisan progress towards ending slavery at home and abroad. 

Governor Schwarzenegger grants clemency to Sara Kruzan

For the past several months, tens of thousands of Change.org members and anti-trafficking advocates around the country have been asking Governor Schwarzenegger to release imprisoned child trafficking victim Sara Kruzan with time served. Last night, he responded to her clemency petition by commuting her sentence from life without the possibility of parole to 25 years to life. That means for the first time in 16 years, Sara Kruzan has hope that, after being enslaved or imprisoned for most of her life, she will finally be free.


Click on the link below to read the full story....


http://humantrafficking.change.org/blog/view/victory_schwarzenegger_commutes_sara_kruzans_sentence

Sara Kruzan!, survivor of human trafficking needs your help!

As a young girl, Sara Kruzan, was abused and sold as a child prostitute for many years. Her pimp began grooming her at the young age of 11 and prostituted her at age 13. , For three years, Sara was raped by strangers so her pimp could profit. Just after her 16th birthday, in a desperate act to escape captivity, Sara shot and killed her pimp. Still a child, Sara was sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole. Sarah is now 32. Her childhood was lost to child sex trafficking, her young adulthood to a prison term.

We do not condone murder.  We do believe that her sentence was unfair and excessive. Sara’s trial took place before the United States government and judicial system had a thorough understanding of domestic sex trafficking. Sara was sentenced in 1995; the U.S. government did not significantly address trafficking until 2000.

Sara’s only chance at freedom is clemency is a petition currently being circulated to urge Governor Schwarzenegger to commute Sara’s sentence to time served. To access the petition, please visit this website: www.freesarahruzan.org