Human Trafficking Research Lab @Millikin

We had a virtual Central Illinois Human Trafficking Task Force meeting today where Cassidy took the minutes. It was nice to see people who I met at the Illinois Statewide Human Trafficking Conference last week in Peoria and talk about recent trends that service providers are seeing. We also discussed the leadership transition as I am moving to South Dakota and the Center for Prevention of Abuse is going to help the Legal Aid Society of Metropolitan Family Services Office in Decatur run the task force in the future. I am sad to be moving onto other locations but it was a nice send off after eight years of serving on the CIHTTF and running the meetings for almost three years of that time. It definitely felt like I was one of the longest serving members but I know I am leaving the task force in good hands. 

This week we attended the first ever Illinois Statewide Human Trafficking Conference in Peoria. It was a great educational and networking opportunity. The conference was organized by the Children's Advocacy Centers of Illinois (CACI), Illinois State Police Investigations, Illinois Department of Human Services, and Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. The Human Trafficking Research Lab was also asked to present on the Central Illinois Human Trafficking Task Force (CIHTTF) and some of the adjudication research we conducted in the lab. The panel "Lunch & Local Task Force Overview" introduced conference attendees to various task forces in the state, including two OVC-funded Enhanced Collaborative Model task forces, one statewide task force, one task force overseen by a local mayor's office, and one task force covering central Illinois.  The conference was attended by over 300 anti-trafficking advocates around the state and I was able to meet many of t...

This semester, I continued my work as an assistant researcher at the Human Trafficking Research Lab. In January, we kicked off the semester by attending a Decatur City Council meeting, where I had the opportunity to read and present a proclamation recognizing Human Trafficking Awareness Month to the mayor. Throughout the semester, I have worked on collecting articles from throughout Illinois dealing with human trafficking cases for our ongoing research project on the effect of media portrayal on human trafficking legislation.   In March, Millikin hosted a meeting of the Central Illinois Human Trafficking Task Force. I had the opportunity to hear professionals from various fields speak about human trafficking prevention and to network in-person with members of the task force. To cap off the year, we will be attending and presenting at the Illinois Human Trafficking Training Conference in Peoria on May 5th and 6th. It has been a successful year, and I am so excited to continue m...

While I wait for my next round of book revisions I am starting work on the next article in our  NSF project that looks at online human trafficking recruitment during Russia's war in Ukraine. This article analyzes the suspicious Telegram data and compares that to interviews from anti-trafficking stakeholders focusing on recruitment dynamics in Ukraine during the full-scale invasion. We examine what recruitment looks like during the war in Ukraine. I am working on the literature review now and it's so interesting to see all of the publications on recruitment that have been published since we started work on this project in 2023.  In the data we compiled on recruitment we found that approximately 15.5% of the total messages on the different Telegram groups were suspicious and could be potential cases of recruitment for human trafficking. The article discusses the array of suspicious recruitment messages that we found in the Telegram Groups including posts over the first 18 month’...

We attended Take Back the Night last night at the Decatur Public Library hosted by our local organization Growing Strong Sexual Assault Center. We tabled to support survivors and this local organization while raising awareness and money to support student research assistants in the lab. Take Back The Night is a global mission to end all forms of sexual violence, including sexual assault, sexual abuse, trafficking, stalking, gender harassment, and relationship violence, and to support survivors in their healing journeys . They had an open mix for survivor to chare their stories or read poetry, a crafting station with friendship bracelets, a photo booth, and information about sexual violence. The theme this year was together we rise and looked to promote the voices of local survivors. I was able to see several Millikin students and supporters that I knew from the community. I was also able to hear from a friend and local survivor about the exploitation and abuse she experienced in Macon ...

The Human Trafficking Research Lab will be tabling at Take Back the Night this year on April 16th. We are thankful for the opportunity to support survivors of gender based violence, to share our research and fair trade chocolate with the community and for our collaboration with Growing Strong. While we have attended Take Back the Night for years and I even spoke in 2018 (and won Community Advocate of the Year), we have never hosted a table so I am looking forward to participating and our continued collaboration with Growing Strong, they local sexual assault center in Decatur. 

  The Human Trafficking Research Lab will be tabling at the Vendor's Market at Milli-Fest with more than 50 other local vendors. We will have Lab merch (pins, bags and keychains), Freedom Studios products (candles, bath bombs, and lotion) made by human trafficking survivors, and free fair trade chocolate from Equal Exchange. Stop by on Saturday April 18 from 11:00-2:00 on the quad to learn about our research and support our work!