International Justice Mission (IJM) is a non-profit organization focused on human rights, law and law enforcement. It was founded by lawyer Gary Haugen in 1997. It is based out of Washington D.C, but has expanded internationally, now having 17 field offices around the world in Africa, Latin America South Asia, and Southeast Asia. They also has five partner offices in North America, Europe, and Australia. IJM requires all of its employees to be practicing Christians.

IJM finds children and families who are victims of violence, forced labor, or sex trafficking. They support local police in rescue operations. They help meet victims urgent needs, like safe housing, food, medical care, counseling and education. They walk along survivors until they are fully restored. They ensure that criminals cannot continue to harm vulnerable peoples, by working with local law enforcement in investigating, arresting and charging slave owners. They have a team of lawyers who will fight for victims until those people are behind bars. Slavery still exists because traffickers and abusers can freely exploit people living in poverty. This is possible because police, judges, and other officials in some countries are not equipped to enforce the laws. IJM provides training, mentoring and support to local law enforcement and other community leaders to slow down and stop the cycle of violence.

I think in the U.S. people have several misconceptions about human trafficking, the first being that it is not going on around them. If they have never seen it, it can’t be that big an issue. It is terrible to think this way! Especially living in an area like Grove City, where we are so close to several major interstates. I once went to an event about sex trafficking by IJM, they had local police show us social media profiles of sex workers and tell us this is what to look out for if you see a friend request from one, what you can do to notify police so that they are able to help them. The officer also showed us certain key phrases pimps and traffickers look for when looking for targets. People who post about feeling lonely, depressed, and unloved are often contacted by traffickers. Traffickers will often approach women as if they want to date them, they will tell them they are pretty and that they think they are special and buy them nice things. They slowly reel them in. Trafficking in the states isn’t two guys in ski masks with a white van with a gun telling you to get in. Another thing to remember is that traffickers will traffic anyone, but more often than not they do target people living in poverty, or who have less than ideal family circumstances. After a while pimps/traffickers will stop treating you nicely they break you down mentally and make you feel worthless so that you truly believe your life doesn’t matter and that no one cares about you, but them. That is why women freed from slavery will sometimes go back to their pimp after they are freed. You may hear people say that sex workers make a ton of money, but the reality is that their pimp takes the money they make controls everything about them. If they have no money and believe they are worthless its extremely difficult for them to leave.

94% of all their employees are native to the countries they serve in. This helps with cultural contextualization. It is a huge advantage to their employees to know the culture they are serving, recognize the severity and impact of their actions, and fully understand the risks and associated with what they are doing.