How Change is Effected: courts, legislation, grass roots - led by Martha Coakley

Session #6:  HUMAN TRAFFICKING

Guests: Rob McKenna, former Washington AG who made fighting trafficking his national initiative

Lisa Goldblatt-Grace and Audrey Morrissey from My Life, My Choice

Only in recent history have law enforcement officials in the US and internationally both identified and tried to address human sex and labor trafficking in any significant way.  Only recently has Massachusetts even passed an anti-human trafficking law.  How did this issue become more visible and identified as one that affects a very vulnerable population, including young girls and LGBTQ youth, even as it is one of the fasted growing economic driver of international and domestic organized crime?  And what does it take, not just to pass the statute but to provide accountability to those who profit from selling others, and provide help to victims who long ago gave up hope that anyone would care about them or provide an alternative to survival, at best, in "the life"?  We will hear from a survivor of human trafficking and those who work to try to provide assistance to those who need help and resilience to both leave "the life" and make a new one.  We will discuss how "changing the lens" on how we view prostitutes, once as criminals, but now more often as victims has been crucial to try to effect change in this area.

Room: Littauer 166, HKS

***All study groups are off-the-record and not for media coverage***