Just How Bad Is Human Trafficking In Illinois

Just how bad is human trafficking in Illinois. The numbers could not be in worse then any other city or state.

Human trafficking is one of the most under reported crimes, but according to UNICEF U.S.A., it is also the second largest crime industry in the world.

Among the human trafficking cases, according to the Human Trafficking Hotline, the vast majority of those cases are sex trafficking. The hotline also reports there have been 4,460 cases reported in the states for the first half of 2017. Among those cases, 3,698 of those affected were female, 607 were male and 53 were identified as gender minorities.

According to the hotline, Illinois ranks 10th for the number of reported cases in the states for the first half of 2017 with 100 cases, following Pennsylvania and North Carolina. Of the 100 cases, 83 of those affected were female. 

You may not be aware of just how prevalent the human trafficking trade is in Illinois. For 2019 alone, approximately 200 human trafficking cases have been identified in this state so far.

The sheer case volume ranks Illinois as the 11th state in the country for human trafficking. Still, only 1 percent of human trafficking victims are ever rescued. That means the problem is likely to be even more prevalent than even these staggering numbers indicate.

Human trafficking is also on the increase in Illinois and nationwide, so it’s likely that these numbers will go up. With figures like these, don’t expect Illinois law enforcement to take human trafficking lying down.

For 2019 alone, approximately 200 human trafficking cases have been identified in this state so far. The sheer case volume ranks Illinois as the 11th state in the country for human trafficking. Still, only 1 percent of human trafficking victims are ever rescued.

“The same 20,000 pimps are moving around to where the action is.” The State Department’s 2019 Trafficking in Persons Report found the Department of Justice opened significantly fewer human trafficking investigations in 2018 compared to 2017, dropping from 783 to 657.

A report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in 2012 estimated that men accounted for 25 percent of trafficking victims globally. Further, the Global Report on Trafficking in Persons estimated that 27 percent of all victims detected globally were children and that of those, one in three victims were boys.

Girls and boys are kidnapped from their homes around the world or are lured in with lies and forced into sex slavery. According to the FBI, approximately 293,000 children are forced into sex slavery in the United States. The average age a child enters the sex industry is 12-14 years old. The victims are expected by their pimp to have sex with between 10 – 30 tricks (people who pay for sex) per day.

“Modern [sex] slavery has reached historic levels,” said Liz Yore, an expert on rescuing sex-trafficked children and an international child advocate who formerly worked for Oprah Winfrey at Harpo Studios.

Yore spoke on Super Bowl Saturday at an educational conference called SpeakOut Illinois, which is hosted by 43 Illinois pro-life organizations. Yore attributed a main factor in sex trafficking’s thriving business to legalized abortion.

The sex trafficking industry makes approximately $87 million per day. The average pimp makes between $150,000 and $200,000 per year off of selling 3-4 victims. Yore says Chicago is ranked 10th as a hub for sex-trafficked children with approximately 27,854 registered sex offenders in Illinois. Chicago, a city plagued by a robust abortion industry as well as easily accessible public and interstate transportation has approximately 16,000 – 25,000 sex trafficked victims every year.