Anti-Human Trafficking Activist Speaks To Zontians

Island Sun, February 2, 2012  submitted by Dalia Jakubauskas

Her story is almost too horrifying

to stomach. Theresa Flores,

mother of three, social worker,

author and anti-human trafficking activist,

was enslaved as teenager in the

1980s. Flores was forced by classmates

she considered friends to service countless

men who paid her tormentors to

rape her – night after night – for nearly

two years.

A world-renowned speaker on the

subject of human trafficking, Flores

recounted her story to island Zontians,

who gathered to hear her story at several

events during January. Flores spoke at

Zonta’s District 11 Inter-City Dinner held

at Doc Ford’s Restaurant on Fort Myers

Beach on January 17 and at a membership

meeting for the Zonta Club of

Sanibel-Captiva on January 18.

Some Zontians sat in stunned silence,

others choked back tears or stifled

shocked gasps as they absorbed Flores’

dreadful story.

As a teenager, Flores fell for a boy

who drugged, raped and blackmailed her

with photos of the crime into sexual servitude.

The boy threatened to show the

photos to her father, his employer, her

family, her teachers and even her priest if

she did not “work off the debt.”

Initially she thought working off the

debt meant washing

his car or doing

his homework. But

what started as a

desire to protect

her family turned

into a nightmare of

coercion, degradation

and violence.

For 18 months,

the then 15-yearold

Flores was

required to be on

call anytime the

traffickers wanted

her. The calls came

mostly at night, when Flores would slip

out of her family’s expansive house in an

upper-middle class suburb of Detroit.

Often barefoot, wearing no makeup,

clad only in pajamas, she never knew

where she was going. She only knew

there would be men waiting to do

unspeakable things to her young body.

When they were through, her traffickers

would return her to her home before

dawn, when Flores would rise and try to

carry on normal days at school.

All the while, no one noticed something

was wrong. Her father worked and

traveled a great deal as an executive for

a Fortune 500 company and her mother

was often busy with social clubs and

events. Neither noticed she was gone during

her night-time absences and teachers

never asked why a good student would

suddenly be sleeping through classes or

had become withdrawn.

To keep her quiet, her tormenters followed

her every move, threatened her

young brothers

with physical

harm and, as a

warning, left dead

animals at her

home. As she

later found out,

these young men were part of a crime

family that operated in the Detroit area.

The abuse only ended when her father

was transferred to a new job and the

family moved away. It was years later

before she confided in anyone and only

recently began to speak publically about

her ordeal.

“The three words I hear the most

when I tell my story is ‘I didn’t know,’”

she said of her audiences. “This is happening

to American kids, not just foreign

kids. I was a normal teenager from a normal,

Irish-Catholic family.”

While statistics are hard to come by

because human trafficking is largely an

invisible crime, approximately 325,000

children are subject to sexual exploitation

every year, according to government data.

The average age of entry into the commercial

sex industry is 11 to 12 years old.

Flores said she was stirred to action

several years ago as her daughter

approached the age that she was

enslaved. She has since authored a book,

The Slave Across The Street, and founded

www.TraffickFree.com, an organization

dedicated to ending slavery.

Flores travels the world to raise awareness

of human trafficking speaking to

any group that wants to hear her story,

including an appearance on The Today

Show in 2009. She was sponsored by

Zontians Carolyn Sweeney and Karen Pati with author and activist

Theresa Flores, center

Author and activist Theresa Flores, left, with

HTAP founder and Zontian Nola Theiss

ISLAND SUN - FEBRUARY 3, 2012 5B

the Zonta Club of Sanibel-Captiva

and its service partner The Human

Trafficking Awareness Project (HTAP)

to attend a series of events surrounding

Human Trafficking Awareness Month

in January, including a class on the

subject at BIG ARTS on Sanibel and

public forum hosted by Edison College

in Fort Myers. Both events were held on

January 19.

Raising awareness is the first step

to ending this heinous crime, she told

island Zontians. She noted that many

volunteer opportunities exist locally as

well as nationally for those seeking further

involvement including HTAP and

forums like the ones at Edison that drew

hundreds of people looking to help.

“Educate yourself,” Flores implored.

“Talk to your kids. Don’t ignore the red

flags. Be aware because now you can’t

say ‘I didn’t know.’”

For further information about combatting

human trafficking, visit www.

TraffickFree.com or www.humantraffickingawareness.

com.

The Zonta Club of Sanibel-Captiva

is a service organization of professional

women working together to provide

hands-on assistance, advocacy and

funds to strengthen women’s lives on

the islands, in Lee County and around

the world through Zonta International.

For information, visit www.zontasancap.

com.

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