Billboards such as this one have been used to raise awareness of human trafficking. (Photo by Kyle Talley)
Anyone who has stopped at a Virginia interstate highway rest area has most likely seen a sticker on the bathroom mirror that reads “Human Trafficking Exists in Virginia. Look Around You.” A billboard on Interstate 64 echoes a similar message to drivers entering Richmond.
These statements are stark, but it’s unclear how extensive human trafficking is within the commonwealth according to its own admission.
Human trafficking is described by the Polaris Project, a nonprofit advocacy center, as a “modern slavery” that from 2007 to 2016 ensnared almost 32,000 men, women and children across the U.S., including an additional 10,085 cases of labor exploitation. Trafficking is divided among 25 distinct categories under two major headings, sex trafficking and labor trafficking. These categories range from higher-profile exploitations such as escort services, illicit massage and solicitation to pornography, construction, hotels and hospitality, and even lesser-known forms in health care, forestry, recreational facilities and even carnivals.
Escort services are the most prevalent form of sex trafficking, which may include in-call and out-call services at hotels and motels and delivery services through online solicitations. Of the 4,651 trafficking cases reported to Polaris in that nine-year period, 4,355 were females, with 1,986 of those minors. Victims report they are often tricked into these services through fraudulent or nonexistent job offers, such as fake modeling contracts.
Children are particularly vulnerable, and actual numbers are difficult to verify due to a lack of centralized reporting. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reports that, in 2022, they received 19,000 reports of possible child sex trafficking.
In Virginia, trafficking has proved to be a challenging problem to untangle and quantify, particularly for juveniles, according to “The State of Human Trafficking in Virginia,” a 2019 report by the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services. “This is due to issues including parental consent, increased confidentiality laws, a lack of emergency housing solutions, the need for specialized mental health services, and an overall lack of understanding of how to identify and respond to a juvenile trafficking victim,” it states. A 2022 report from the state’s sex trafficking response coordinator points out that such cases are usually referred to federal officials, so “the lack of state-maintained data about these cases should not be interpreted to mean that no juveniles in Virginia are involved in prostitution or trafficking.”
The overall picture of trafficking in Virginia is “almost impossible to quantify,” according to the DCJS. “The data that we do have comes from legal cases and prosecutions,” the report states, “however, many cases are never reported to law enforcement. This means that many human trafficking cases are unaccounted [for]. Some individual agencies and service providers keep statistics; however, they are only representative of the population served by that agency.”
The 2022 report similarly points out problems facing law enforcement and prosecutors. Data from 2020 and 2021 suggests that the COVID-19 pandemic “significantly hindered” proactive investigations, and prosecutions largely relied on prostitution-related sections of the Code of Virginia, as opposed to laws targeting commercial sex trafficking.
So what do we know about human trafficking in Virginia?
According to a 2019 Federal Bureau of Investigation report, the latest available, there were 37 cases involving commercial sex acts in Virginia that year, with one involving a child younger than 18. There were four cases of involuntary servitude.
Since 2007, the National Human Trafficking hotline has received 6,398 “signals” (which include phone calls, texts, emails and online reports) identifying 1,698 cases of human trafficking and 3,573 victims across the commonwealth. In 2014, Virginia had the fifth-highest number of human trafficking cases reported on the hotline, due largely to its East Coast location, international air and seaports and major interstates. Signals to the hotline from actual victims or survivors of human trafficking in Virginia have been ticking up since 2017, which recorded a low of 61 signals received. That total jumped to 85 in 2018, 145 in 2019, 185 in 2020 and 199 in 2021, the last year for which totals are available. Virginia is now ranked 20th in the U.S. based on hotline signals.
In 2021, investigators from the Hampton Roads Human Trafficking Task Force opened a probe into a Williamsburg-based company, Magnolia Cleaning Services, after receiving a tip from an alleged victim’s friend. They found almost 100 trafficked illegal immigrants, including a 13-year-old from El Salvador forced to work 11-hour overnight shifts while also attending school during the day. Another victim was made to work under threats of deportation and physical violence, then was also forced to pay rent to live in a commercial laundry facility where she had no access to a kitchen, shower or bath.
In August, Magnolia co-owners Ana Landaverde and Jeffrey Vaughan, both of Williamsburg, and George Evans, of Midlothian, were sentenced were sentenced to prison terms ranging from two years to almost five years. Of the case, Attorney General Jason Miyares said, “There is a reason why anyone in law enforcement will tell you there’s a special level of revulsion towards those that exploit our minor children.”
Between January and May 2022, Si Liu and codefendants Yang Gao and Ye Wang were arrested for human trafficking following police raids in four Hampton Roads massage parlors. This past March, they pleaded guilty to money laundering and conspiring to conceal proceeds obtained through prostitution.
These arrests are a result of the significant progress Virginia has made in combating trafficking since the sticker initiative in 2015, both legislatively and through nonprofits such as imPACT Virginia, which has partnered with numerous private and state entities to educate people on the issue.
Virginia State Police partnered with the Virginia Department of Emergency Management to create the Virginia Fusion Intelligence Center under legislation signed in 2005 to improve the commonwealth’s preparedness not just against terrorist attacks and natural disasters, but human trafficking as well.
In April 2022, VSP also partnered with the Virginia Trucking Association and U.S. Homeland Security in Operation Safe Passage, a short-lived but high-visibility campaign to educate truck drivers of the warning signs of human trafficking.
“Preventing human trafficking and providing support to its victims have been a priority of Gov. [Glenn] Youngkin and his administration since stepping into office in January,” then-Virginia Secretary of Public Safety and Homeland Security Bob Mosier said at the introduction of the campaign. “I am extremely pleased to see the Virginia State Police taking an aggressive and active stance towards addressing what has become a global pandemic.”
