Human Trafficking ~ Support Services

Middle Way House provides services, including emergency shelter, for survivors of human trafficking. You may call for help 24/7 at (812) 336-0846.

HUMAN TRAFFICKING is occurring right here and now in Indiana. It is a problem everywhere. For example, families could be holding servants against their will. Restaurants could be forcing workers to work for free or reduced rates. People could be forced into sex work.

If you suspect someone is being controlled in a manner that deprives them of their freedom that is similar to human trafficking, you could contact the National Human Trafficking Hotline toll-free at 1-888-373-7888

The U.S. Department of State estimates over 27 million people across the globe are currently trapped in a form of modern day slavery and the United States has been identified as a significant hub for both labor and sex trafficking.  Middle Way House staff can help you if you are in this situation.

Sex Trafficking is when a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such act has not attained 18 years of age.

 

What is Human Trafficking?

Human trafficking is the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception; of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation.

Types of human trafficking include:

  • Sex exploitation

  • Labor exploitation

  • Domestic servitude

  • Forced marriage

  • Forced criminality

  • Child soldiers

  • Organ harvesting

The Reality of Human Trafficking:

Trafficking can happen to anyone, regardless of citizenship status or length of me living in a country. Trafficking does not require transportation. Although transportation may be involved as a control mechanism to keep victims in unfamiliar places, it is not a required element of the trafficking definition. Human trafficking is not synonymous with forced migration or smuggling, which involve border crossing.

Although poverty can be a factor in human trafficking because it is often an indicator of vulnerability, poverty alone is not a single causal factor or universal indicator of a human trafficking victim. Trafficking victims can come from a range of income levels, and many may come from families with higher socioeconomic status.

Trafficking can occur in legal and legitimate business settings as well as underground markets. Human trafficking has been reported in business markets such as restaurants, hotels, and manufacturing plants, as well as underground markets such as commercial sex in residential brothels and street based commercial sex.