Human Trafficking Research Lab @Millikin

I was able to attend the Illinois Statewide Human Trafficking Task Force meeting yesterday while I was traveling and it was eye opening. Social service providers in my break out groups reported a decrease in foreign born forced labor survivors/victims coming forward because they are afraid to seek help or even leave their houses and go outside due to immigration enforcement. Others reported an increase in victims/survivor numbers but agreed that there are long last impacts and significant impediments to identification with the large scale immigration enforcement across the state. Many organizations now have to offer online services to meet the needs of their clients because otherwise people would not seek assistance. In addition to the significant federal funding cuts for human trafficking victim services this is just another worrying trend that is emerging from the current administration that inhibits anti-trafficking work around the United States.

In the midst of all of the planning for the Global Freedom Summit this week I was asked to give an interview with WCIA News on Illinois' second place ranking for human trafficking policy in the US. Though the interview was online, a camera person came to the Human Trafficking Research Lab to get so B-roll footage to go with the story (picture below). I was proud to talk about the rankings and be part of the Joint Human Trafficking Working group that developed the Illinois Statewide Trauma-Informed Response to Trafficking Act. It's also pretty cool to be featured in an interview along with the Illinois State Police Director. Here is the link to the story if you would like to watch the interview " Big changes in the state led to Illinois being ranked near the top for human trafficking survivor laws ." 

  Yesterday was the implementation of our A21 Global Freedom Summit class project! We had over 50 people from the community and one student went down to the cafeteria to bring up more attendees. The students in my PO 323 Human Trafficking developed an interactive game, educational information to teach people about human trafficking, a public relations strategy, and an advocacy table to advocate change in our community (with QR codes and post cards to mail to representatives). The human trafficking button making was a hit and many people played the roll your fate human trafficking scenario game that students developed. The new Millikin president even stopped by and chatted with students. We also had the event featured in our student newspaper The Decaturian " A21’s Global Freedom Summit Comes to Millikin " and the Decatur Tribune " Millikin University to host anti-trafficking Global Freedom Summit film screening ." In class the next day we debriefed on what went well...

Students in my PO 323 Human Trafficking class have been working hard to implement and host the Global Freedom Summit at Millikin this semester, a film screening event designed to raise awareness about human trafficking and equip communities to take action. Since this class is particularly grim and students can get overwhelmed at the enormity and scope of the crime, I try to organize a final project that uses things we have learned in class to improve the status quo. This year when I heard that the A21 Walk for Freedom was being transformed to a film screening I thought we could transform it in my class. We began brainstorming activities that would complement the film. Then I took this list and broke it up into four different groups: social media, education, advocacy, and activities and games. Students signed up for the group they were most interested in and we started working on the project. The social media group had to start earlier with their project and have already published a...

The Shared Hope International " Just like me Report Cards " came out this week and Illinois moved from an F with a score of 54.5 in 2023 to an A with a score of 94. This moves Illinois to the second best score in the entire United States behind Maryland for encompassing laws aimed at combatting child and youth trafficking. Illinois is one of only three states in the entire US that received an A in the 2025 report. This is the biggest increase Illinois has registered in the Shared Hope International's rankings since the rankings came out 2011 and it is also the only time Illinois has been awarded an A. This sharp increase is due to the adoption of the Illinois Statewide Trauma-Informed Response to Trafficking Act which raised Illinois scores several categories of the report though there is still progress to be made in protecting victims from unjust criminalization and survivor-centered support services. The report recognized gaps in non-criminalization and juvenile court j...

We had Millikin homecoming last weekend and the Human Trafficking Research Lab participated in the Homecoming Makers Market sponsored by Millikin's Women in Business student organization. The market was on the quad and lots of alumni, students, community members and staff stopped by to chat about our work and get some coveted fair trade chocolate. I also sold a bunch of bath bombs, buttons, and keychains and raised money to support student research assistant salaries in the lab. The candles had a lot of competition at the market and it was interesting to see what other sellers had and how they displayed their items. I also got some ideas to make magnets and possibly t-shirts in the future. Thanks so much to everyone who stopped by to support the Human Trafficking Research Lab and learn more about our work!

Since our DOJ grant ended last year I have been looking for more sources to revenue to continue funding student research assistants in the Human Trafficking Research Lab. First, I made bags and then I made key chains and over the weekend I made some glass cabochons buttons. We will have a table at the Millikin Maker's Market on the Saturday of Homecoming from 10:00-2:00 sponsored by the Women in Business student organization.  I also thought it might be a good opportunity to start selling some small items (bath bombs, lotion and candles) from Freedom Studios a small business which helps survivors of human trafficking rehabilitate and heal through meaningful employment. After learning abut them at the Liberator Awards, I wanted to see if the lab could sell some of their products with proceeds going to help my students research human trafficking. Every product that they make is created in their studio and made by a survivor. Their mission is to give survivors the keys to unlock a new...

Today I attended an interesting training webinar from Freedom Network USA on criminal record relief. Many of the students who work in my Human Trafficking Research Lab become lawyers and so I was interested in learning more about how we can do this for survivors in our community! I learned more about older laws on human trafficking that still on the books including The Mann Act (White-Slave Traffic Act of 1910 of its official title An Act to further regulate interstate and foreign commerce by prohibiting the transportation therein for immoral purposes of women and girls, and for other purposes) which criminalizes transporting women for prostitution or immoral purposes, using interstate or foreign commerce (named after Congressman James Robert Mann of Illinois who introduced the bill in the House of Representatives). They also spoke about the differences between vacatur laws, sealing records, and expungement laws. It was interesting to see the differences across the US on Post-Convictio...

Since the Enhanced Collaborative Model (ECM) Task Force to Combat Human Trafficking funding ended in October 2024 there have been questions as to whether the Central Illinois Human Trafficking Task Force would continue. Several key players had people move on to different positions and so I was really debating if we should continue the task force. I met with colleagues at the Legal Aid Society office in Decatur and we agreed to continue the task force with Millikin and the lab organizing the agendas and minutes from the meeting and then Legal Aid Society would run the meetings. Then in early September we sent out a survey to members to ask if they wanted to bring the task force back together and the response was an overwhelming yes. So now we are working on the results and preparing for our next meeting in November. I think there are a lot of expectations on what the task force should do so we are going to have to bring those in line with a largely volunteer task force but I am hoping w...

I am teaching my human trafficking class again and so our first assignment was participating in the Red Sand Project on campus and around town. I first learned about this all the way back in 2015 in Atlanta when I participated in human trafficking workshop geared towards college students at the National Center for Civil and Human Rights in Atlanta The Red Sand Project is a participatory artwork created by Molly Gochman that uses sidewalk interventions and earthwork installations to create opportunities for people to question, connect and take action against vulnerabilities that can lead to human trafficking, modern slavery, and exploitation . Every time I teach my human trafficking I use this project as a starting off point to critically discuss human trafficking awareness projects and what we can do to improve them. So if you see some red sand around campus that is from my students. Here are a few of my favorite photos from students in my class this year from around Millikin!

Big human trafficking policy news in Illinois! Governor Pritzker signed the Illinois Statewide Trauma-Informed Response Human Trafficking Act into law last week with several other bills. This law  focuses on improving prevention and intervention efforts while and establishing standards for survivor support services within several state agencies ( Illinois State Police, Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS), Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS), Illinois Department of Labor (IDOL), Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice (IDJJ), Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC), Illinois Law Enforcement Training Standards Board (ILETSB), Children’s Advocacy Centers (CACs), the Office of the State’s Attorneys Appellate Prosecutor, the Illinois Secretary of State, and other stakeholders ).  Part of the law requires the development of a single statewide plan to identify and respond to survivors and we have already been working on that all summer as part o...

July 30 is World Day Against Trafficking in Persons. It is a day proclaimed in 2013 by the United Nations General Assembly in resolution A/RES/68/192. The day aims to “raise awareness of the situation of victims of human trafficking and for the promotion and protection of their rights.” We usually post something on the HTRL blog today about our work in recognition of this day but this year with all of the discussions on human traffickers in the media and budget cuts to the trafficking work around the world I have felt nothing but dread and apprehension about the future of the movement. The United States has been the leader in the anti-trafficking movement and has made counter trafficking a policy priority since the bi-partisan adoption of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) in 2000, devoting resources and chronicling progress and setbacks around the world through the Trafficking in Persons Report. As I wrote about in a previous article the TVPA built the foundation for traffi...

I was asked to present my research project "Identifying Potential Human Trafficking Recruitment during Humanitarian Disasters and Russia’s War in Ukraine" with colleagues from Worcester Polytechnic Institute while I am here in Regensburg as a Visiting Fellow at the The Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies (IOS). The event was sponsored by the Leibniz Science Campus Regensburg, Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies (IOS), Regensburg, University of Regensburg, “Denkraum Ukraine” / “Think Space Ukraine” funded by the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) with funds from the Federal Foreign Office (AA). We only had a week to put the event together but I had a great turnout and discussion on our research project. I explored some preliminary findings from our dataset on online recruitment technologies during the first 1.5 years of the war consisting of: 482,000 collected and cleaned online posts from Telegram channels Interview data from Uk...

I found out a few weeks ago that the Illinois State Police (ISP) Division of Criminal Investigation Trafficking Enforcement Bureau was moving to Decatur. This is great news for our city because it means the main labor trafficking organization in the Illinois the Legal Aid Society of Metropolitan Family Services has an office is located in Decatur, the state's only research entity focused on human trafficking is here (the Human Trafficking Research Lab), and and now the main policing entity will also be based in Decatur. ISP also recently announced that a multiagency task force is being formed to combat human trafficking in Central Illinois and will base its operations in Decatur. The Illinois Trafficking Enforcement Group, will be led by the Illinois State Police and include the Decatur Police Department and the McLean County Sheriff's Office as partnering organizations. This group was approved by the The Decatur City Council sand you can read more about it in this story from t...

Starting my month long visiting fellow residency at IOS at the Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies/Leibniz-Institut für Ost- und Südosteuropaforschung (IOS) in Regensburg Germany. I will be working on our NSF funded research project on human trafficking recruitment in Ukraine during Russia's war. The Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies (IOS) is one of the largest and most traditional non-university research institutions of its kind in Germany—it dates back to 1930. I am looking forward to lots of data analysis, networking, and having the opportunity to use the amazing library here. I found out they only choose 15 fellows a year so it is an honor to be here and the first time I have ever lived in the western part of Europe. 

I attended my first RUTA Association for Central, South-Eastern, and Eastern European, Baltic, Caucasus, Central and Northern Asia Studies in Global Conversation conference in Uzhhorod, Ukraine. It was a wonderful conference focusing on anti-imperialism and the influence of colonialism around the world. I heard speakers from Syria, Palestine, Chechnya, Africa and it was amazing to meet them all in Ukraine and show solidarity with Ukrainians as they continue their battle with Russian imperialism. I presented on the panel "Visions for anti-trafficking, empowering and healing" with other Ukrainian scholars. Here is a picture one of the organizers took of me presenting in the archeology museum of  Uzhhorod National University. I also loved the inclusion of different art mediums at the RUTA Conference. Everyday during lunch they hosted "The Tent of Resilience: A Participatory Art Intervention" immersive installation. I had a wonderful motanka workshop with a master from ...

Summer is usually a slower time at Millikin, when most students and faculty are off campus. A spot opened up on the WSOY Radio with Byers and Co and since Maggie was going to be in town for basketball camps we went and talked about our work on the Joint Human Trafficking Working Group. The main goal of the group was to facilitate legislation to improve and coordinate a response and as a result the Illinois Statewide Trauma-Informed Response to Human Trafficking Act was passed by both the Illinois Senate and House in May and is awaiting Governor Pritzker's signature. As a scholar of human trafficking policy it was interesting to be in the inner circle formulating policy and trying to improve services for victims and survivors. Here is a link to the interview if you would like to listen .  

The Human Trafficking Research Lab at Millikin invited to be a member of the Human Trafficking Working Group sponsored by the Illinois Human Services Department in 2024. This group was tasked with working on legislation SB2323 Illinois Statewide Trauma-Informed Response to Human Trafficking Act. We lobbied and filled out witness slips for the house and senate bills and the Governor will sign this bill into law in summer 2025. We were proud to serve on the statewide working group that wrote this legislation and our research is featured in this WAND News story ! Great news for survivors seeking justice in Illinois!

Continuing my work within the Human Trafficking Research Lab has deepened my understanding of the issue and helped me recognize the essential skills and empathy required for this kind of work. Before joining the lab, I had a limited view of what human trafficking really entailed. Through hands-on research and survivor narratives, I’ve come to understand both the complexity of the crime and the shortcomings in how our legal system identifies and addresses it. Human trafficking might seem easy to define as it typically falls under one or more of three main elements: force, fraud, or coercion but simply knowing a crime occurred and actually proving a crime occurred are two different things. Through the stories shared by survivors and the patterns I studied within the lab, I've learned instances which involved human trafficking. The justice system has often struggled to name and prosecute trafficking for what it is. As a result traffickers are usually charged with a lesser offense that...

As I finish my Criminal Justice practicum in the Human Trafficking Research Lab, I have come to realize that human trafficking labs have a big impact on crime research and development. I realized from analyzing in Champaign County the data is that it can be complicated to identify possible trafficking cases however there where cases from 2017 of different forms of exploitation and solicitation. I also had to make possible conclusions of certain cases of possible trafficking, where these cases had a child unlawfully restrained and sexual abuse in these cases. This demonstrated that children are possible being restrained for exploitation which could be considered human trafficking. I am thankful for the opportunity to do research in the lab this semester. Devin Top

This semester in the Human Trafficking Research Lab has been busy. Earlier in the year, I attended a panel discussion on human trafficking and how police tackle the challenges and developments that they come across. I was representing the lab and informing people about the work that we do at Millikin. There were several police officers present as well as FBI agents who answered questions from Dr. Dean and students who came to watch. They talked about the implications of the new policies put into place by the Trump administration, and spoke on their experiences with fighting human trafficking.  Throughout the semester, we met in the human trafficking lab to discuss our work that we have done with data collection. We also learned from Dr. Dean about students who came before us, and the work that they did with the lab. The meetings were productive, and they taught me more about who supports the work we do. We met once every two weeks, and the meetings were small in size so that we cou...

I was at Cambridge University for the Conference on Baltic Studies in Europe las week and was able to visit a the Fitzwilliam Museum and their special exhibit Rise Up: Resistance, Revolution, and Abolition. The exhibit was really well done and I learned about slavery from the context of the United Kingdom especially in their colonies in the Caribbean and Africa. I also learned about abolitionist Olaudah Equiano who seemed similar to Fedrick Douglas from the American context as a formally enslaved person who write and spoke about their experiences. The exhibit also talked about the museum's connections to slavery which I felt was very appropriate in coming to terms with their colonial past.  I plan to use some of what I learned in my fall Human Trafficking class and am thankful for the opportunity to learn new things about the international abolition movement.

This semester I have been completing my criminal justice practicum at the Human Trafficking Research Lab examining cases from Champaign county in 2018 and 2017 in the court case database Clericus Magnus and in the local media. During my research I have found several cases of grooming which can meet the definition of human trafficking. In 2018 there was a case of a man convicted of both sexual offenses and grooming which means that alleged trafficker was attempting to persuade someone to do things against their will. Groomers commonly use social media and technology. Another case from 2018 that I located I found that the perpetrator was found guilty of soliciting a sexual act, as well as harassment through electronic communication and disorderly conduct. These actions can be classified as grooming and even stalking and have elements of human trafficking but were not charged as trafficking. In this research it is clear that parents need to monitor their children's online activities a...

Dr. Dean, Akeila, and I attended the Liberator Awards in Columbus, Ohio the last weekend in March. The Lab was a finalist in the student organization category. At the ceremony, we were seated next to two survivors and a woman who ran the resource housing for survivors for the HerSong organization. The survivors were very enthusiastic to share some of their stories with us. Currently, they are both pursuing degrees in social work. We asked about their opinion of criminalization of sex work. They both agreed that their arrests and time spent in jail and prison was the leading factor in getting them away from their traffickers. Additionally, there is a program specifically in Ohio that serves in rehabilitation and services for individuals with substance abuse disorder and may be facing trafficking. More information on the program can be found here .  Maggie Schrage