The first challenge victims had to overcome in order to escape was the constant monitoring by traffickers. Isolated labor settings coupled with heightened supervision created limited opportunities for exit. Although methods of monitoring manifested in different ways across the various industries victims were labor trafficked in, all victims reported a high level of surveillance. As our victim case data indicate, 93 percent of victims had their movement to and from work controlled. The heavy monitoring of victims prevented them from having ample opportunity to access help.
When we came into the States they actually used to strictly supervise me. I mean no one . . . I was never left unsupervised. You know? If people leave, there was always a person at the house watching me, watching me. (site 3, survivor 6, female, domestic servitude)
We are limited now to go somewhere else without the authorization. The employer now is a caretaker. It is like a prison now, like four months like that. (site 1, survivor 3, male, trafficking venue unassigned)
They had strictly prohibited me from talking anyone. I couldn’t open the door to anyone and I didn’t have communication with anyone. When someone came to the house, they wouldn’t leave me alone. They were always there. (site 2, survivor 6, female, domestic servitude)
In addition to the traffickers’ surveillance, some victims had to overcome physical and geographic barriers. Domestic workers who worked in private residences often struggled to develop social ties that could facilitate their escape or strengthen outsiders’ understanding of their situation. Many domestic workers were the sole employees of the trafficker. Unlike victims in other industries, such as hospitality, they did not have colleagues with whom to compare pay stubs or talk to about their situation, leaving victims to fend for themselves and strategize independently. For individuals working in remote areas, such as victims in the agriculture industry, escaping was not just a matter of walking away; geographic segregation created new challenges. Our interviews with victims brought in under
H-2A visas to work raising sheep illustrated the degree of isolation victims experienced. As the quotation below demonstrates, some victims’ work sites forced them to be in complete isolation.
If it was at night, we would work until 10 or 11 p.m. at night, sometimes in the desert, in the field, in the mountains. When one goes, one is responsible for food and everything. . . . Alone, alone. . . . Your friends were the little dog that came with you and the horse during the seven [or] eight months in the mountains and the other time, until it was a year, you would go to the desert in the winter. . . . Because we went far away from the city. Once we went working, we were no longer in the city or close to a city. You are very far from the city so, we didn’t even see vehicles pass by. None of that. None of that. We only saw the desert and the mountains. (site 3, survivors 8 and 9, males, agriculture)
Victims held in remote locations were often forced to plan ahead and depended on the support of friends and strangers to escape. Even victims who were in trafficking situations with other colleagues, however, faced challenges. Many lived in employer-sponsored housing, creating a platform for traffickers to exercise a higher level of surveillance. Our case data records indicate that 61 percent of victims were living in traffickers’ quarters at the time of the victimization. Although victims had the support of peers and were able to strategize with coworkers about methods of escape, they still had to overcome the traffickers’ heavy monitoring.
In addition to vigilant control of living conditions, the traffickers’ use of coercion, fear, and threats often prevented victims from leaving. Many victims feared that without money they would not be able to receive assistance, and in many cases they did not have the money to pay for transportation to leave the trafficking venue and/or lacked the social network connection to relocate. Victims were also afraid of the repercussions they would face if they left. Victims’ fear about their personal safety were well founded, as our case records indicated that in 15 percent of cases force was involved during or after escape, and 26 percent of victims experienced coercion during or after the escape. As the quotation below illustrates, for some victims, escaping was believed to be a matter of life and death.
They were two things in my mind at that time. If I ran away and I was safe then I would for sure meet my kids again. If I got caught I was sure that I would die. (site 1b, survivor 4, female, domestic servitude)
Further, victims had to take into consideration not only their personal safety but that of their family’s if they decided to escape. Across our interviews with survivors, many reported being afraid that the trafficker would retaliate. Victims understood that even if they were able to leave the situation, they might not be able to escape the trafficker’s abuse. Trafficker’s access to their personal information, including their home country address and names of family members, meant that
providers below describe, victims not only had to think about how their lives could be in danger by escaping, but how they were risking the lives of their family members in their home countries:
And probably the most serious risk that, um, that people face when they consider sharing information about a trafficker is threat of retaliation. That’s often what the more serious traffickers rely on, is that no one in their immediate surroundings would dare to put themselves in a situation where enforcement might get involved and it would go back to them, or it would go back to the fact that someone spoke, because in cases like that, there can be a threat of violence against a person. But also when you get into the migrant community, traffickers have . . . at least the ones that I deal with, have extensive enough networks that they have the ability to send people to find the families of people who are working . . . living and working here in [name of site]. So even if they themselves are feeling brave about, you know, being able to escape, you know, to move towns or find another job or, you know, just give up some information, they might fear that these powerful traffickers can get in touch with people they know at the border, get in touch with people they know in whatever area of Mexico they are recruiting workers, and find their families. (site 4b, victim service providers 2 and 4)