By Tommy Acosta
Sedona News (August 1, 2021) Can any parent imagine the horror of their child being procured by a sex trafficking ring?
There are no words to describe the fear and pain associated with one’s own flesh and blood being torn from one’s life and never seen again.
The same for the child that is procured, who suffers the terror of being ripped from their parents and the world they once knew, raped, tortured, forced to commit unspeakable acts and even murdered by these sick monsters. The sleepless nights, the panicked stomach-churning thoughts that come wondering what happened, what is happening and what will happen to your child, grandchild, sister or brother.
The depth of the pain is fathomless.
Society cannot turn its attention away from the reality of the sex trafficking of children that are forced into a lifetime of slavery and sexual servitude to those they are sold to and then disposed of when they are too old and no longer useful.
Something must be done to stop them and fortunately there are groups here in Sedona and Arizona that are joining together to find
ways to combat the malfeasance of these heartless traffickers and find ways to better defend against them.
On Thursday, August 5th starting at 6:30 p.m. at the Canyon Trails Cowboy Church, 3132 White Bear Road in Sedona, a group of individuals dedicated to helping those who are victims of trafficking and enlightening the community to this scourge, are holding an educational meeting open to the general public.
Presentation Chairwoman Sharleen Henderson will launch the event with Carol Gandolfo, President of the Coalition of Human Trafficking in Northern Arizona and Andrea Kadar, Ambassador of Hope & Shared Hope International, joining in the presentation.
The discussion will focus on the following questions:
- How prevalent is child trafficking?
- Who is at risk?
- How to prevent a child or grandchild from being “procured.”
The presentation is being hosted by the local chapter of Citizens of America.
Make it a point to attend and arm yourself with information you can use to perhaps thwart an attempted kidnapping and save a child’s life.
3 Comments
Tommy, thank you for raising awareness on this important subject. We will be talking about how prevalent this crime business is (and why), how lucrative it is, what happened right here in Yavapai County that inspired us to get involved, how easy it is to procure a teenager (and exactly how it is done), the social media sites that can be problematic if your child is unsupervised or innocent about the potential dangers, what happed to sex trafficking during the Covid lockdowns, and what YOU can do as a responsible parent or grandparent to protect your children from predators and pimps.
We also intend to show a short mini-documentary (9 minutes) on what happened when a youthful 39 year old mom went “undercover” on social media sites and posed as a 15 year old. The film will put an exclamation point on what we will be teaching our audience about Internet safety.
Don’t think it happens here? Come join us for the discussion …because it definitely does.
I encourage everyone to become involved in this fight. Our children ARE at risk. Sex trafficking is on the rise as more and more criminals find out it is easier to sell a child than drugs or guns. You can get involved by coming to our events, going online at caht-naz.org and signing up to receive our emails and by donating to our cause.
Its so important for people to realize that sex trafficking is occurring in our own backyards. People tend to think that this is an issue that happens elsewhere. Its unfathomable that such a horrifying crime could take place in our own neighborhoods. Some parents don’t think that their kids could ever be targeted.