It’s called modern day slavery, or human trafficking. That’s where the illegal trade of a person is made by use of force, abduction for the purpose of paying debts, forced labor or sexual exploitation. Local groups in our region are working hard to make sure there’s a voice to the victims.
It’s estimated by the International Labor Organization report in 2017 that roughly, 24 million people are trapped in human trafficking. Of that number 71% are usually women.
“Article-paragraph”>Here at home, one woman is trying to bring attention to the problem. Her name is professor Deborah Davies from Mercyhurst University. She works with the Anti-Human Trafficking Coalition in Erie and says it could be closer to home than you realize.
“Someone does not need to be overseas or even across the border to be trafficked. Your child could be sitting next to you, on the sofa at home and being trafficked right next to you. That’s the scary part. It is real and it’s right here,” says Davies.

It’s the largest interstate in the country, I-90 extending coast to coast. It keeps many secrets.  Secrets of people, and places they’ve been. It kept Annette Mango secret for decades.
“That’s what they’re good at. They’re good at finding people who are vulnerable, who want something,” says Mango.
Vulnerability. That’s what these people prey on.
“One day I was at the bus stop, I remember it was winter. It was cold and a young lady came up to me and said, We always see you out here and now that it’s cold out here I have somewhere you can go,'” explains Mango.
That’s what started Annette’s two-decade long journey of being sex trafficked.
“He began selling me and began beating me,” Mango retells.
She was a drug addict, down and out of her luck. She was looking for a way to feed her addiction. It would take jail for her to find her path to freedom.
“Did I try to get out? Yes. Did I want help? Yes,” she says.
That’s when she met Renee Jones. She’s the Director of the Renee Jones Empowerment Center in Cleveland.
“If they don’t have a voice no one will ever know their story,” says Jones.
It’s a center that helps women escape sex trafficking and start a new life.
“What she said to me was Annette, how can I help you?” Mango says that moment was especially memorable for her.
Rarely, Mango explains that while she was trapped in the vicious cycle of human trafficking was she asked what she needed.
“We ask them what they need,” explains Jones.
For many victims of sex trafficking, they just need a way out. That’s what the Renee Jones Empowerment Center does.
“The goal is to get you out of that lifestyle and help you live a brand new life,” says Jones.
At Mercyhurst, Davies works to spread awareness about sex trafficking.
“People don’t think human trafficking goes on in Erie,” says Davies.
But it does. Through I-90, a handler is able to take their victim to the other side of the state or even out of the country.
“It can happen so fast, you can be relocated so fast within a couple of hours,” Jones says and has seen this happen first hand with the women that come into the center.
That’s why Davies started the Anti-Human Trafficking Club at Mercyhurst, That club has deliver soaps to local motels that has the number to the National Human Trafficking Hotline on it.
“If you were a victim and happen to be in a hotel or a rest stop and you knew you were a victim, which is another big problem, and didn’t want to be in that situation at least you know who to call and how to do that,” explains Davies.
Davies wants parents to hear this message: anyone can be a victim to human trafficking, and that victim could be sitting right next to you.
“Parents especially, if their children are online or using apps where they’re meeting people in the virtual sense, there’s a huge threat online. Parents first of all need to be aware of it and take it seriously as well,” says Davies.
The Crime Victims Center also has a 24 hour help hotline to anyone who is a victim of a crime.