The international issue of human trafficking is an all-too-familiar issue in many parts of the state of Texas. With areas like El Paso and Houston identified as some of the largest human trafficking hubs in the United States, it is important to understand how these areas, and others like them in the state, are responding to human trafficking. Using areas identified by CEASE Texas as having high sex trafficking solicitation activity, as well as publicly released information of law enforcement and community responses in these areas via internet search engines, a holistic understanding of combating human trafficking can be seen in metropolitan areas in Texas. This chapter concludes by examining what information remains unknown in these areas, and postulates about the intertwined relationship between human trafficking and other crimes against persons in the state of Texas.
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In 2019, Lacey’s Hope Project, a United States-based human trafficking and awareness organization, released a Human Trafficking Awareness Month public-service announcement (PSA) entitled “Mary Mack.” In this video, two female children play Double-Dutch jump-rope in front of an older adolescent female as the camera pans in. The following rhyme from the children can be heard as an unidentifiable male enters the frame, caresses the face of the female, and leads her out of frame:
Miss Mary Mack (Mack, Mack), all dressed in black (black, black), didn’t tell her mother (mother, mother), there was a man (man, man), who said she must (must, must), follow his plans (plans, plans). He promised love (love, love), and told her lies (lies, lies). She’ll be a slave (slave, slave), ‘til the day she dies (dies, dies) (Lacey’s Hope Project, 2019).
This vignette is the unfortunate experience of numerous survivors, and those currently victimized by human trafficking. Synonymous with both a human rights violation and modern-day slavery, human trafficking is defined as any use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of forced labor and/or sexual exploitation against one’s will (Houston Mayor’s Office, n.d.; National Human Trafficking Hotline, n.d.; Texas Advisory Committee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights, 2011; Texas Attorney General’s Office(a), n.d.; Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, n.d.). Because of the nature of the offense, human trafficking is often largely unknown and underreported to state and community stakeholders, thus making exact numeration of trafficking near-impossible. 2019 data from Polaris, an organization that brings awareness to sex and labor trafficking, estimated over 22,000 individual victims and survivors and 11,500 cases of human trafficking in the United States (Polaris, n.d.). Traffickers who engage in these criminal actions receive tens of thousands of dollars per trafficked person and compose a criminal network that produces billions of dollars annually (Texas Advisory Committee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights, 2011). Simply put, “[human trafficking] is very profitable” (Texas Advisory Committee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights, 2011: 1).
This chapter seeks to highlight responses to human trafficking at the state and local levels in Texas by examining the collective work of community stakeholders and grassroots organizations, as well as the introduction and implementation of various legislative efforts. Where the existing body of scholarly literature comes up short in outlining human trafficking activity in Texas, intervention by law enforcement, and resources provided by community and grassroot organizations, provide more context for the paradigm of the fight against human trafficking in the Lone Star state. Using these collective resources, and high trafficking activity areas identified by CEASE Texas, partial or full timelines of responses can be established over the last decade and beyond. CEASE (Cities Empowered Against Sexual Exploitation), led by the organization, Children at Risk, and funded by the Texas Governor’s Office, seeks to “1) gather and provide real-time data on the online [sex trafficking] buyer landscape via a dashboard & chatbot, 2) gather local stakeholders to discuss combating demand, and 3) establish cyber patrols through which members of the community can fight the demand for sex trafficking in their city” (n.d., para. 2). Figure 1 identifies these areas highlighted by CEASE Texas, which include Austin, Corpus Christi, Dallas, El Paso, Fort Worth, Galveston, Houston, Midland, Odessa, San Angelo, and San Antonio. The importance of using CEASE as a unit of measure is to highlight how the same issue is addressed across different areas of a vast state with varying levels of resources and immensely different geographical challenges. Finally, this chapter will close by highlighting concerns related to what is publicly available and known of the local and state responses towards combatting human trafficking in Texas.