Human Trafficking Research Lab @Millikin

In May 2023 before taking students to the Baltic States a colleague and I put together a data collection project proposal for the National Science Foundation  D-ISN/RAPID  entitled "Data Collection for Human Trafficking Recruitment and Responses in Forced Migration" focusing on Ukraine . We found out this week that the grant was recommended and funded! The grant is a rapid grant which means we will spend the next year collecting, compiling, and analyzing time-sensitive data (online and interviews) along the entire trafficking cycle – from recruitment, transfer, exploitation, and exit in Ukraine. The full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 provides an example of crises where war, displacement, and economic crisis fuel inequalities and increase vulnerabilities to human trafficking with ripple effects around the world. The case of Ukraine is a fruitful crisis case for data compilation because of the prevalent use of technology during the migration process which means that

Over the summer I worked in the lab and did my internship at a local law firm. I started examining the pulled cases on LexisNexis an online legal research platform. We were hoping that this platofrm would give us more information on the cases than is available online. Unfortunately, I only found few specific examples of the cases I have pulled from our dataset. For any cases that I did find a related case through Lexis, there was limited information without any specific details regarding the details of the crime charged. The only information I found was a restatement of the charges brought against the defendants.  In addition, the cases are all at the appellate level. There are no entry-level cases featured on the site. This means that the only cases that render any results are those in which the decision of the jury or judge was appealed, and the case was subsequently heard by a higher court. For the few cases that did reach higher courts, none of the cases added any details to help t

On Wednesday, August 16, 2023, Dr. Dean and I joined the Byers and Company radio show on WSOY, a partner of Now Decatur to discuss recent work in the Human Trafficking Research Lab and recent news stories involving the topic of human trafficking.  Dr. Dean was able to lead an informative discussion on the definition of human trafficking and the many different varieties of actions that fall under the trafficking umbrella. The host, Brian Byers, took an active approach to hosting the conversation, with a very inquisitive manner throughout the discussion. Throughout his hosting, he consistently questioned the validity of recent news headlines regarding the popular film Sound of Freedom, a human trafficking film. Dr. Dean and I were able to add some important qualifications to the validity of the film and added context to the “Hollywood” factor of the film. We attempted to critique the stereotypical depiction of a small section of human trafficking instances portrayed in the film and discu