ABSTRACT
Numerous criminal justice agencies, researchers, and nonprofit organizations present concrete and undeniable connections between pornography and forced sex work involving human trafficking. Familial relatives, corrupt public officials, members of organized crime, and gangs are involved in commercial human trafficking. Human trafficking is the second-largest illegal market in the world (Tanagho, 2007). The market for human traffic generates $19 billion each year; most of the revenue is produced from commercial sex sales of women and children (Initiative against Sexual Trafficking, n.d.). Approximately 500,000 to 1 million children and adults are internationally trafficked annually (Tanagho, 2007). Intranationally, thousands more are trafficked each year. Annually, thousands of victims from Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America are trafficked into the United States. Some victims are kidnapped; others are held as indentured servants to repay the costs of trafficking. Thus, some trafficked individuals voluntarily travel across borders. A portion of these people knowingly and successfully hire or barter with traffickers to be transported covertly across borders.
