Archive for the ‘News’ Category

Wanted by the FBI

Producing Child Pornography; Aiding and Abetting the Production of Child Pornography; Unlawfully Possessing a Firearm; Engaging in Sex Trafficking of a Minor; Aiding and Abetting Sex Trafficking of a Minor

Eric Antwan Bell

Aliases: “Santana,” Eric Dean, Anthony Ellis, Laveric Santana, Laverick Santana, Kelly Thomas

Date(s) of Birth Used: March 11, 1974

Place of Birth: Tallahassee, FL

Height: 5′8″

Weight: 190 lbs

NCIC: W051895955

Occupation: Long Haul Truck Driver

Hair: Black

Eyes: Brown

Sex: Male

Race: Black

Nationality: American

Scars and Marks: Bell has a tattoo on his chest. He also has scars on his right finger, right hand, and right elbow.

Remarks: Bell allegedly makes false identification. Bell has ties to the New York and New Jersey areas; and Gainseville, Tallahassee and Bradenton, FL.

CAUTION:

Eric Antwan Bell, a convicted felon, is wanted for his alleged involvement in the sex trafficking of minors in the Tampa, FL area. It is alleged that Bell had underage girls working for him from his residence since 2008, and advertised them for prostitution on the Internet. A local, state, and federal multi-agency task force initiated an investigation in 2009. On January 3, 2011, a federal warrant was issued for Bell’s arrest by the United States District Count, Middle District of Florida, Tampa, Florida, after he was charged federally with producing child pornography, aiding and abetting the production of child pornography, unlawfully possessing a firearm, engaging in sex trafficking of a minor, and aiding and abetting sex trafficking of a minor.

REWARD:

The FBI is offering a reward of up to $5,000 for information leading to Bell’s arrest.

SHOULD BE CONSIDERED ARMED AND DANGEROUS

If you have any information concerning this person, please contact the FBI’s toll free number 1-866-838-1153 in Tampa, FL; your local FBI office; or the nearest American Embassy or Consulate.

Field Office: Tampa

See picture on HOW TO HELP page

Kendis Paris, Truckers Against Trafficking (TAT) national director, will be speaking on human trafficking, TAT and the critical role the trucking industry can play in the fight to end human trafficking at the Commerical Vehicle Training Association (CVTA) fall 2011 conference in Washington, D.C., Sept. 15-17. Her presentation is currently scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 17, from 10:15-11 a.m.

Check out the article (http://www.noomizo.com/index.php/end-slavery-tn-truckers-against-trafficking-wash/) on End Slavery Tennessee and the event they held at Daily’s Truck Stop in Lebanon, TN where they washed truckers’ cabs and told them about Truckers Against Trafficking and how to fight slavery on the highways of our nation. Way to go!!! Hope others do this as well!

Sex trafficking occurs at truck stops in the United States often in two forms, through pimp controlled prostitution and through massage parlors. Pimps frequently move their victims from city to city, forcing victims to engage in commercial sex at truck stops along the way. Brothels disguised as massage parlors are also sometimes present at or near truck stops. These networks control women through confinement and complicated debt bondage schemes.

For the rest of this story, please follow this LINK to Polaris Project’s webpage.

Polaris Project has been awarded the highest rating of 4 stars by Charity Navigator for 3 consecutive years for being fiscally responsible and financially healthy.

If you are a victim of human trafficking and need immediate help or if you suspect a potential trafficking situation, call the hotline at 1-888-3737-888 now.

The National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC) works to improve the national response to protect victims of human trafficking in the United States. The NHTRC runs a national, toll-free hotline available to answer calls from anywhere in the country, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year. Contact the NHTRC to report a tip; to connect with anti-trafficking resources in your area; or to request training and technical assistance, general information or specific anti-trafficking resources. The NHTRC is operated by Polaris Project and funded by the Department of Health and Human Services and other supporters.
Sex Trafficking at Truck Stops

NHTRC Truckers Against Trafficking Report:
December 7th, 2007 – May 31st, 2011

• Take away: Truckers Against Trafficking is successfully reaching a population that provides valuable intelligence about sex trafficking, frequently of minors. Their work is generating frequent hotline calls about a network that would go unreported without trucker engagement. The National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC) has received over 125 calls from Truck Drivers. Of these, more than 60% resulted from awareness and outreach efforts conducted by Truckers Against Trafficking.
• Truckers Against Trafficking has conducted targeted awareness efforts about human trafficking and the NHTRC hotline through radio programs and ads, newsletters and articles, their website, and other mediums.
• Approximately 42% of hotline calls from truckers are tips about potential human trafficking; in comparison, 15% of all hotline calls are classified as tips. In another 33% of calls, truckers called requested general information about human trafficking; many of these truckers later call to report trafficking.
• Of the cases reported by truckers referencing trafficking, approximately 62% involved potential minors in sex trafficking situations. Pimp control sex trafficking was the most common type of trafficking reported by truckers, and was reported in 58% of the calls referencing trafficking.
• Take away: Truckers Against Trafficking is successfully reaching a population that provides valuable intelligence about sex trafficking, frequently of minors. Their work is generating frequent hotline calls about a network that would go unreported without trucker engagement.
Vignette: While driving through Flagstaff, Arizona late at night, a trucker pulled over at a truck stop near the highway. The driver observed a man who appeared to be in his late thirties with a young girl who appeared to be around 13 years old. At first the driver didn’t think anything was wrong, but after observing the man and the young girl approach several other truckers, the driver became increasingly suspicious. The driver spoke with one of the other truckers, who told him that the man with the young girl was offering to sell her for commercial sex to the various truckers they had approached. The driver decided to contact the National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC), since he had heard about the human trafficking hotline on a radio spot by Truckers Against Trafficking. After receiving the driver’s report, the NHTRC reported the information to a federal law enforcement taskforce that works specifically on cases of commercial sexual exploitation of children.

For every new fan to Lone Mountain Truck Leasing’s Facebook page, they will donate $1 to Truckers Against Trafficking up to $3000. This fundraiser runs from June 10-20. So just click on the following link and “like” the page. It has never been easier to help fight human trafficking! Thanks Lone Mountain Truck Leasing! http://alturl.com/x8cjj

Check out the excellent article in Pilot’s Challenge magazine about Truckers Against Trafficking — http://ptcchallenge.com/2011/06/truckers-against-trafficking/.

Please Help the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape by Taking the Survey
The Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape (PCAR) is trying to reach truck drivers who travel PA interstates to get their opinion and collect information on what they may be witnessing – not what they’re doing, only what they’re witnessing — along PA interstates involving sexual activity being exchanged for money, food, drugs, shelter and/or transportation. The state is having a problem with under-aged kids and adults being sold by pimps along their interstates (youngest so far 11). This survey is anonymous, and all responses will be used to educate the researcher. To complete this anonymous survey online, please visit: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/MKLB7QG. Thank you for assisting the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape with this initiative.

Chapter 61 Ministries, in cooperation with a key trucking industry participant, TravelCenters of America (TA), is expanding its educational outreach on the issue of human trafficking. Human trafficking training materials, made available to members of the trucking industry through Truckers Against Trafficking (TAT), an initiative of Chapter 61 Ministries, will be used by TravelCenters of America (TA) to educate its workforce and help raise awareness about TAT’s key issues to its community of customers.

“We’re extremely encouraged by TA’s participation to help get our message across,” said Kendis Paris, TAT national director. “Their decision to use TAT materials will disseminate the message to thousands of members of the trucking industry and better equip them to understand and help fight human trafficking, which is why TAT exists.”

Commenting on TA’s decision to participate in this educational role, Barry Richards, executive vice president of TravelCenters of America, stated, “Truckers are among our country’s most caring, upstanding individuals, and trucking-related initiatives like TAT work to address issues important to the trucking community.  TA is proud to be part of that community and to play a small part in furthering TAT’s mission among its many trucking community supporters.”

The TAT initiative has a four-fold purpose: to educate members of the trucking/travel plaza industry about human trafficking and the role they can play in fighting it, equip them with tools, empower them with steps to take and mobilize them to take a stand against one of the world’s most lucrative and destructive crimes. The initiative includes a website, www.truckersagainsttrafficking.com where the TAT video can be viewed; webinars; Human Trafficking 101 classes; wallet cards with questions to ask, red flags to look for and the National Hotline number to call if trafficking is suspected; posters; and publicity and promotion.

 Human trafficking, a term for modern-day slavery, is a $32-billion worldwide industry with more than 27 million people enslaved in the world today. In the United States, it has been reported in all 50 states, and the number of victims is estimated in the hundreds of thousands.

For more information, please contact chapter61@gmail.com or Kendis Paris at 720-202-1037.

Posted: // Apr 08, 2011 10:18 AM CDT

OKLAHOMA CITY — An Oklahoma County judge has ruled in favor of Oklahoma City in a lawsuit aimed at stopping rampant prostitution at the Five Star Truck Stop on N.E. 120th Street.

On October 26, 2010, the city filed a nuisance abatement lawsuit against Mian Rashid, the owner of Five Star Truck Stop. The lawsuit stated the truck stop was a public nuisance due to prostitutes who were often seen servicing truckers in the parking lot.

The city filed the lawsuit after issuing two notices to Rashid, advising him on how to rid his property of the so-called “lot lizards.” Despite the notices, the suit claimed Rashid made no attempt to stop prostitutes from plying their trade at the truck stop. Read rest of story at News9.com.

Truckers Against Trafficking (TAT) is sending a packet of TAT materials to the owner of this truck stop to help them comply with the directives given by the judge and to identify any human trafficking going on as part of the prostitution taking place.

Read the article on the growth of human trafficking and what truckers can do to thwart it in the April 2011 issue of the digital online magazine RPM for Truckers (www.rpmfortruckers.com). The article, titled “Highway Hostages,” written by Brad Bentley, starts on page 22.

To download the Truckers Against Trafficking training DVD, go to the vimeo site shown right below the video on this website. Click on it or on the vimeo link in the copy right below the video. This will take you to the vimeo site where the video can also be watched.

You will need to join vimeo in order to download the video. To do that, you will need to set up a user name and password.  Look for the box on the right-hand side of the page that has a large MOV in it. Click on join.

Once you have joined and signed in, look for a box on the page that says: Want more from vimeo … and then by the MOV, it will say download this video …
 
Right-click on ‘download this video,’ choose ’save as’ or ’save link as.’ You can then rename the video and save it to a file on your computer.

Marion and Yvonne Williams, trucking recruiters as well as the film producers for the anti-human trafficking film A Dance for Bethany, will be hosting a Trafficking in America conference June 10-12 in Nashville, TN and would love to have you attend. More information on the conference, the speakers, agenda and details, are available at http://www.traffickinginamericaconference.info/.

Keep Making Those Calls

While we can’t always post the success stories that are taking place out there due to ongoing investigations and the like, rest assured that truckers are making calls to the authorities, are helping trafficking victims (any prostitute under 18 is one), and are being real heroes as they become Truckers Against Trafficking! Thank you!

We’d like to share a couple tips that will help when you make those calls. Once you make the call and law enforcement is involved, the entire case is then under their authority. Any member of the trucking industry dealing directly with law enforcement in a human trafficking case called in needs to keep the following in mind:
1. Every case is different, and law enforcement in every locale may handle a case totally differently.
2. Law enforcement will be putting together a case, and while they’re putting together a case, unless THEY release information to the media, they will not want information on the case or any ongoing investigation leaked to anyone, as this could impede the investigation and/or damage the case before it comes up for trial. The immediate case could be part of a larger and more comprehensive investigation, and, as such, none of the information should be shared.
3. You need to specifically ask law enforcement if you can share any of the information, and if so, what can you share and to whom … and if not, absolutely comply with what law enforcement specifies. If law enforcement releases information to the media, that is the only information they want released – nothing else.
4. If law enforcement is gruff or rebuffing, don’t be offended. You’ve done your part, now comply with their requests so they can do theirs.

Second, please remember to “press through” (keep on making calls) when things don’t go right. Some of those things that may not go right are:
• law enforcement does nothing when they come
• the girls are back at the truck stops even after they’ve been rescued

Law enforcement training still needs to take place in numerous towns and cities across the country. And while there are a few good rehabilitation homes and shelters for trafficking victims in the country, there is a need for a great many more quality homes. Without really good support and rehab once victims are rescued, they are easy targets for additional victimization.

Fifty years ago, few people understood domestic violence. The understanding of human trafficking in this country today is similar to domestic violence then. Fifty years ago the police did not come into a home with domestic violence on their mind, and there were no safe houses for vulnerable women. It’s the same right now for human trafficking in most parts of the country, so the need is enormous to continue to educate, to continue make those phone calls so Congress and others in authority will understand the need and allocate the funds and mandates necessary for the training and rehab facilities and support that trafficking victims need, just as they finally did for victims of domestic violence.

Check out the latest issue of Mia Magazine at www.miamagazine.net and read the article written by Kylla Leeburg, one of the national coordinators for Truckers Against Trafficking. The article is on pages 18-19 and 34-35 of the latest issue — Spring 2011.