Typically, these women and children are taken to another country, usually in western Europe, Japan, Hong Kong, the U. S. or Canada, where they do not speak the language and have no legal visa, and are forced into prostitution. They are held in inhumane conditions where they are beaten and raped, and many contract AIDS or venereal diseases. If they do not comply with the demands of their captors, food and water are withheld, and threats are made against their families back home. When these prostitution trafficking rings are discovered, even in the United States, not much is done to the criminals because the law does not treat these crimes as the kidnapping and rape which they actually are. The victims, who are undocumented aliens, are put in jail, sometimes for many months, while police try to get information about who brought them into the country.
Many victims are too traumatized to testify and too afraid of retaliation by the traffickers.
They have good reason to fear, because they face deportation to their home country where they will be at the mercy of the criminals against whom they had testified. It also provides for a reduction in U. S. financial aid to governments which tolerate or condone human slave trafficking. The next step for HR 3244 is consideration at a hearing by the Judiciary Committee which decides which proposed legislation reaches the floor of the House for a vote. Rep. Henry Hyde is chairman of the Judiciary Committee. The Clinton administration has so far thrown up obstacles to every attempt to stop sexual trafficking of women and children, evidently because those in the administration do not see prostitution as something wrong and evil.