CBA Record Feb-March 2017

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YLS Special Issue lPROTECTING OUR CHILDREN
CBA RECORD 31
by the CBA Young Lawyers Section during
the 2017 Human Trafficking Awareness
Week was subtitled, “Learn how you can
take meaningful action to help protect
children and make a difference.”The prob-
lem has been that up until now it has been
difficult for those concerned about human
trafficking to take action other than calling
law enforcement or the hotline when they
see something suspicious. Once, however,
the spotlight is put on the infrastructure
of trafficking, there is plenty of room
for action, and audience members at the
seminar had many important suggestions.
This article summarizes some of the legal
and extra-legal efforts now underway to
dismantle the infrastructure that supports
trafficking for sexual exploitation. Lawyers
have been front and center in the recent
efforts and have a large part to play.
The Internet
An undercover officer responded to an
advertisement in the Casual Encounters
section of Craigslist in 2015 which read
“Come Sleep with Daddy’s Little Girl.” He
was offered two hours with the four-year-
old daughter of the advertiser in exchange
for $1,000. When the officer arrived at the
assignation, he was shown the young girl
lying naked under a blanket in a groggy
state, perhaps drugged with sleeping pills
(Salinger, 2015).
The current market leader in com-
mercial sex advertising is
(hereinafter Backpage), netting more than
80% of such advertising revenue in the
United States Permanent Subcommittee
on Investigations, United States Senate,
’s Knowing Facilitation
of Online Sex Trafficking: Staff Report
(2017), available at
reportedly internal revenue reports demon-
strate that from 2013 to early 2015 99% of
Backpage’s worldwide income was directly
attributable to the “adult section.” K.D.
Harris, Attorney General Kamala D. Harris
Announces Criminal Charges against
Senior Corporate Officers of Backpage.
com for Profiting from Prostitution and
Arrest of Carl Ferrer, CEO (2016), available
at For years now,
law enforcement officials, including our
own Cook County SheriffTomDart, have
lobbied Backpage to do more to remove ads
of minors from its site. When Backpage
remained adamant, they brought lawsuits.
Due to federal law (Telecommunications
Act of 1996, Pub. L. No. 104-104, (110
Stat.) 56 (1996).) that the courts have said
provides near complete criminal and civil
immunity to Internet providers for the
content others have created (Permanent
Subcommittee on Investigations, 2017),
all plaintiffs have failed.
Sheriff Dart then successfully lobbied
major credit card companies to prohibit use
of their cards on Backpage. Subsequently
Backpage sued Dart in federal court and,
because of a finding that the sheriff had vio-
lated its First Amendment rights, obtained
an injunction against Dart’s contacting
credit card companies or financial institu-
tions in the future.
Following a multi-year subpoena
enforcement effort, early in 2017 a Senate
subcommittee (cited earlier) issued an
analysis of the long sought after docu-
ments. The subcommittee found that
Backpage was editing the ads in the adult
section manually, looking for the use of
forbidden words and easing them, elimi-
nating the necessity of rejecting entire ads
(and thus losing money). Such words
included “little girl,” “teen,” innocent,
“Lolita,” and “school girls.” This practice,
which changed nothing about the real
age of the person being sold on the site,
implicates Backpage in creating the content
of the ads. Early in 2017, the California
Attorney General filed criminal charges
against Backpage owners and operators
hit with new pimping,
money-laundering charges in California
(Dec. 27, 2016), available at http://reut.
rs/2lE7bS9.) based on the findings of
money laundering in the report (earlier
charges had been dismissed due to federal
Internet immunity). In January 2017.
ILLINOIS TRAFFICKING FOR SEXUAL EXPLOITATION STATISTICS
126 Sex trafficking cases charged in Cook County since 2010. 32% of victims in cases charged were minors.
198 Reports of human trafficking cases from Illinois in 2016 to the National Human Trafficking Resource Center hotline. 30%were minors, 79%U.S. citizens.
1,004 Human trafficking cases in Illinois have been identified by the Hotline since 2007.
National Statistics
7,572 Human trafficking cases reported to the Hotline in 2016. The vast majority involved sexual exploitation.
31, 659 Cases identified by the Hotline since 2007.
2,310 Cases of human trafficking between 2009-2014 confirmed by federally-funded local task forces (covering only a fifth of the country).