Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Human Trafficking topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Committee approves bill to increase penalties for recruiting trafficking victims from shelters and other vulnerable settings
Summary
The committee passed House Bill 16-09, which would permit enhanced sentences when trafficking offenders recruit victims from shelters, foster homes, residential treatment centers, correctional facilities or other settings identified as high-risk; sponsors said judges retain discretion and recruitment targeted at the facility must be shown.
State Representative Lundstrom presented House Bill 16-09 to the House Judiciary Committee, describing it as an enhancement vehicle for judges when a trafficking offense targets particularly vulnerable people.
The bill would permit enhanced sentences where an offender recruited, enticed or obtained a trafficking victim from specified high-risk settings, including a shelter facility operating as a residential treatment center, a youth runaway program, a foster child, a homeless child, persons at risk of being trafficked through domestic violence or assault contexts, or from a correctional facility. Lundstrom said the measure is intended to help judges respond when “predators go to these shelters and recruit children.”
Representative McCullough asked whether someone who was both a recruiter and a victim could be subject to the enhancement; Lundstrom said that would be a question for the judge and courts to decide. Representative Collins asked whether the statute requires the recruiter to have targeted the facility rather than merely recruiting someone who happened to be a resident; Lundstrom said, “The facility have to be together. It's not just someone who happens to be living at a shelter. Right. They go for the purpose of recruiting them at the shelter.”
Lundstrom closed for the bill and the committee voice-voted in favor; the chair announced the ayes had it and said the bill passed.
