Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott gave the keynote opening address in San Antonio today welcoming federal, state and local law enforcement officials, prosecutors and crime victim advocacy groups to the South Texas Coalition against Human Trafficking’s 2011 conference.
Abbott highlighted Texas law enforcement authorities’ joint efforts to combat human trafficking statewide.
“Collaboration is absolutely essential to unravel human traffickers’ tangled web of crime,” Abbott told conference members. “Human traffickers specialize in using force, fraud and coercion to compel their victims into modern-day slavery. By continuing to build up the demonstrated collaboration we’ve already achieved in Texas, law enforcement officials can help ensure our State is both hostile territory for human traffickers and a safe haven for their victims.”
Abbott told why dismantling human trafficking operations requires collaboration at the local, state and federal level – from law enforcement agencies, prosecutors and victim advocacy groups.
Recently, the North Texas Trafficking Task Force – which included the Attorney General’s Special Investigations Unit, state and federal law enforcement agencies, and six North Texas police departments – conducted undercover operations through Super Bowl Sunday that resulted in a total of 133 arrests.
In one case, the Attorney General’s Special Investigations Unit and Grapevine police officers arrested a female and charged her with prostitution. After she was released from custody, the woman told the Attorney General’s Special Investigations Unit that she was a sex trafficking victim and identified her trafficker.
Dallas police officers and task force members successfully located and arrested Joshua Andrews, 39, and charged him with Trafficking in Persons. Law enforcement authorities connected the woman with crime victim advocates to help her recover from her trafficker’s abuse.
Abbott also emphasized the continued work of the Texas Human Trafficking Prevention Task Force to identify, investigate and prosecute trafficking cases statewide.
Recently, the task force’s joint investigation determined that a woman and her three children were trapped in a forced-labor situation after they were smuggled into El Paso through a tunnel running under the U.S.-Mexico border. Two of the smugglers were identified and indicted on trafficking charges.
Abbott noted that collaborative prosecutorial efforts also protect the State from human traffickers.
In one case, a federal jury convicted a defendant of trafficking young females for forced, unpaid prostitution – and sentenced him to almost 34 years in prison.
This spring, the Attorney General’s Office will assist the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Houston with another domestic sex trafficking case. According to investigators, six defendants coerced women and children into prostitution and transported them from Texas to other states.
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