65,000 children were lured into the sex trade in California between 2009
and 2010, yet only 13 people were ever sent to prison human traffic
during that time.
On Monday September 24th. 2012 Governor Jerry Brown has signed legislation to help prevent sex trafficking crimes involving minors in California.
This bill gives prosecutors new tools to help ensure that criminals who
are convicted of sex trafficking crimes are denied access to the
resources, equipment, and cash flow that would allow them to operate and
commit future crimes.
“With
this new law, California prosecutors and law enforcement officials will
be able to seize assets of human traffickers, cripple their operations
and aid victims,” said Attorney General Kamala D. Harris. “Human
trafficking is big business in California. It is a high profit criminal
industry that is expanding rapidly across the globe, including here in
California.” The bill goes into effect on January 1, 2013.
Currently over 160 countries the world over are affected by
human trafficking. The United States is both a source country and a receiving
country. There are still open sex slavery cases in every single state.
Additionally, close to 2,000 children go missing in the United States on a
daily basis. Monique Lessan, a private investigator out of Northern California,
has made it her mission to put an end to both of these looming problems.
Monique was born to a strong and courageous woman in Tehran,
Iran. Her mother, at 16, became one of Tehran’s first police women. She served
for over 25 years and was honored by being made a captain. Monique later moved
to France and then the United States. At
24, Monique has the misfortune of being kidnapped herself. Luckily for children
all over, she escaped and in 1993 she became a licensed P.I.
While Ms. Lessan has worked on many cases throughout her
career—from background checks to gathering evidence of adultery—her focus
turned to child recovery in 1996. Since then she has been around the world
working to return children to the safety of their families. Now Lessan is
taking things one step further. “My focus became locating missing children
because I was kidnapped I’ve learned many
hard lessons and now I want to pass them on to the younger people. Make
them aware of their surroundings.” she says.
Monique started a program—recently approved as a
non-profit—called Teens Against Human Trafficking. She began by working with a
group of students at Healdsburg High School, educating them about the facts of
human trafficking and discussing the dangers and how to prevent it. The
students then made 3 videos about human trafficking and presented them to over
300 of their peers. You can view their videos here: http://www.youtube.com/user/eyeinvestigateyou?feature=mhw5#p/a/u/0/GuCXKfo_F_g
Monique also was able to get the group of students air time
on a local radio station. She was extremely proud and impressed at the
knowledge they had accrued. “I got them on the radio and they were talking
about sex trafficking as if they were experts.” Monique has since gotten to see
her educational efforts take effect. “They had never thought of those ways of avoiding
and deterring sex trafficking until this project. Now they know. They tell
their friends, Don’t get into that car.’
Or, ‘ when you go hiking, pay attention to your surroundings and don’t get lost
on your iPod because you don’t know who’s behind you.’ … Now they know to pass
on the information.” Working with kids and watching them spread the massages
they have learned has been her most memorable experience.
Now that her organization has been granted non-profit
status, Monique Lessan hopes to see it grow in the future. She recognizes what
a huge role the media plays in our everyday lives and wants to use it to
further her message. “I want to use the media to take on a bigger scale and
level, if at all possible, because that’s the only way. That’s why I’m writing
books about the subject and speak in high schools to the students to bring
awareness to them ”
And Monique has not forgotten about all of the children that
go missing every day. A big goal for Ms. Lessan is to produce a show in the
vein of America’s Most Wanted. She and her teams of investigators recover lost
children live and also take donations from supporters to be used to rescue
missing children at no cost to their families. When costs for retrieving a
missing child are $30,000 minimum, this would be an enormous help to families
everywhere.
When talking with teens, Monique stresses the little things
that can keep you safe such as never accepting a drink from an open container
and never getting into a car with someone unless you have known them well for years. One of her most important
pieces of advice is, “Never be a victim. Whatever you do, always just protect
yourself. Know your options. Knowledge is the truth and truth is knowledge. So
if you know your options and you know what’s going on, you will never become a
victim. And never have a victim mentality.”
Monique travels to Bangkok, Thailand to recover a little
girl who was kidnapped by her mother and deliver her safely to her father in
the United States. The mother had kidnapped her during a visitation and brought
her to her home country, where she intended to sell her daughter to traffickers
for drug money. Monique worked with a local PI to conduct surveillance on the
mother’s parent’s house hoping it would lead to the girl. The child was being
held by human traffickers, but once Monique located her, a successful plan was hatched to
grab the child and return her to her father.
Monique handles one of the toughest cases of her career: the
sexual abuse of a five-year-old-girl at the hands of her father and his friend.
The girl’s mother, a drug addict, provided no protection. As the mother talks
casually about the incident Monique reflects back to her own abuse. Monique
fought in courts against the parents, went head-to-head against a disinterested
court system and social service agencies and eventually prevailed. Over the
years she kept in touch with the foster family that eventually took the child
in and helped them legally adopt her.
If a child is in urgent need of assistance, contact law
enforcement or child protective services to report abuse, neglect, or
exploitation of a child. The Childhelp® National Child Abuse Hotline
professional crisis counselors can connect a caller with a local number
to report abuse. Contact Childhelp at 1.800.4.A.CHILD. (1.800.422.4453).
The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children®
(NCMEC) aims to prevent child abduction and sexual exploitation; help
find missing children; and assist victims of child abduction and sexual
exploitation, their families, and the professionals who serve them.
Contact NCMEC at 1.800.THE.LOST (1.800.843.5678).
The HHS-funded National Human Trafficking Resource Center
(NHTRC) operates a hotline 24 hours a day, every day. The NHTRC will
help callers identify and coordinate with local organizations that
protect and serve victims of trafficking. Contact the NHTRC at 1.888.3737.888.
Or call Monique Lessan @ 707-395-0215/858-568-4972
or email: investigatrix@gmail.com
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Friends and Fans of Monique Lessan:
We are HONORED to have her speaking at this very important conference being held for a very important cause. Please take a moment to view this short vid about it, and if you think it's as important as Monique and I do, then please pass it on.
With many thanks, Patricia
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrpyY05fULo
Women's Power Strategy Conference - March 24, 2012 San Domenico School, San Anselmo, CA
http://womenspowerstrategyconference.com
8.4
million of them are children with the largest numbers in India, Pakistan,
Bangladesh, and Nepal.
1.8
million children are forced into prostitution or pornography with the largest
numbers in India, Brazil, Thailand, and the Philippines.
The
average age of a girl forced into sexual slavery is 13.
A
girl in a brothel is forced to service up to 20 clients a day.
Children
as young as 5 years old are sold into sexual slavery and forced to work in
brothels.
Each
year 1.2 million more children are forced into slavery. That’s over 3,000 a
day.
Child
slaves are forced to work in prostitution, agriculture, domestic servitude,
mines, rice mills, brick kilns, factories, rock quarries, and as soldiers.
Child
slaves are often forced to work up to 15 hours a day.
