Dear Friends of The Home Foundation,
California Against Slavery is now circulating a state-wide initiative petition for signatures.The initiative would deter traffickers with stiffer criminal penalties and fines, aid district attorneys in prosecuting human trafficking offenses, increase protection for human trafficking victims, and mandate human trafficking training for law enforcement officers. The CAS initiative is consistent with human trafficking legislative bills introduced but takes it further. For instance, the key language in AB559 sponsored by Assembly member Swanson is in the CAS initiative. AB559 expired last month without leaving the Assembly. It would add to the human trafficking offense anyone who “causes, induces, or persuades” a minor into sex trafficking or attempts to do so. Our initiative has the identical language, but goes further. For instance, the initiative eliminates some huddles for prosecutors by removing the consent of the minor, his/her history of sexual conducts, and claim of oblivion about the minor’s age as defenses by the traffickers. The initiative also has evidential protection for these victims. AB16 also introduced by Assemblyman Swanson mirrors the intent of our initiative. It would have added human trafficking as an offense under the Three Strikes Law. Introduced in December 2008, this bill like AB559 also died in the Assembly last month. Of seven bills introduced in the state legislative session last year, only one passed (AB17). One of the provisions of AB17 allocates forfeited assets to community based organizations for cases involving minor sex trafficking. Our initiative expands this to labor cases and cases involving victims of any age. It will also make sure that at least 50% of the seized trafficker assets will be routed to community-based organizations that provide direct services to trafficking victims. The initiative will undeniably make California’s anti-trafficking law a stronger deterrence mechanism and provide more protection for victims than currently. If given the chance, we believe that California’s voters will pass the initiative to speak up against human trafficking. Thus it is crucial that the initiative gets on the ballot. We need 600,000 voter signatures by March 31, 2010, to qualify for the November 2010 ballot. That is 6,000 Californians getting 10 friends to gather 10 signatures each.
For more information, please visit our website www.CaliforniaAgainstSlavery.org. Thank you for your collaboration to fight human trafficking in every corner of the world.
Regards, CAS Team