Trafficking in humans

More than 17,000 people were smuggled or trafficked into the United States last year. Some were duped into believing that jobs awaited them and instead were forced into debt peonage, required to work in orchards and fields or as housemaids to reimburse the cost of their transport. Others, mostly women and children, were trafficked into sex slavery, and still others were shipped in by boat or brought across the Mexican border by organized smuggling rings.

April 25, 2009