Advice to media: First, do no harm

By Tom Tracy - Florida Catholic

MIAMI GARDENS — Human trafficking watchdogs concede they have probably lost ground against the growing forms of modern day enslavement so they encourage the media to tell the victims’ stories — especially in Florida, the state with the third largest human trafficking problems nationwide.

But the public awareness and media campaign against human trafficking should never come at the expense of the victims’ overall well-being and of criminal prosecutorial considerations.

That was the message a panel of media and legal experts gave to journalists, attorneys, law students and others at St. Thomas University’s School of Law Nov. 18. The event was part of the university’s ongoing special work in providing leadership on the human trafficking problem both regionally and on an international level.

Whether it’s agricultural workers held in servitude, domestics or resort and hotel staff working without real freedoms, or sex workers and prostitution rings enslaved in suburban homes, human trafficking can be found in all cities and areas of Florida, seen by many as ground zero for such operations.

“It’s important for victims to discuss details of their story to the media with eyes wide open because it could have an effect on prosecution – even in cases that are no longer active,” said Tamara Lawson, criminal law professor at St. Thomas and a former deputy district attorney in Las Vegas.

“The same care we bring to protecting the identity of children in child abuse cases applies to all human trafficking cases,” Lawson said, adding that there is often a public bias against the persons being trafficked.

With a grant from the U.S. Justice Department, St. Thomas University has been sponsoring a number of community events and workshops through its Human Trafficking Initiative, a kind of virtual educational effort that brings to bear Catholic Church principles on the dignity of the human being to the trafficking issue.

The need to work more carefully with the local media in covering the story comes after a series of missteps with the victims who are either re-traumatized by retelling their story too early, who jeopardize their privacy in one way or another, or who compromise law enforcement’s efforts to bring the traffickers to justice.

Inconsistencies in a victim’s story as told by the media have occasionally prompted the courts to throw out otherwise valid cases of human trafficking.

Some of the problems have been blamed on reckless journalists, naïve victims who feel compelled to speak too freely about their experience, or poor handling by the attorneys and social workers who accompany human trafficking victims in their media interviews.

“Victims sometimes feel compelled to talk but we as service providers or lawyers have to be careful not to take advantage of that by asking them to talk to the media,” said Mercedes Lorduy, an attorney and co-director of VIDA Legal Assistance in Naranja.

A longtime advocate for domestic abuse victims, Lorduy said she encourages human trafficking victims to work with journalists and law enforcement in telling their stories — but to take extra care to ensure confidentiality whenever that is a priority. Other victims sometimes choose to identify themselves.

“They have to be emotionally ready for that — even when they talk to law enforcement,” Lorduy said, adding that victims need to be counseled that their media stories could be seen far and wide through the Internet and social media, and that their family and friends may read things that the victim may later regret.

The media, Lorduy said, can help fight human trafficking by working closely with law enforcement and social workers to change the details of a specific case in order to shield the victim from being identified. Likewise, victims should not be allowed to improperly use the media to strike back in vengeance at their traffickers.

Teri Arvesu, executive producer of Univision Local Media, has covered the human trafficking story in South Florida, including the high profile case of a Palm Beach financier who was arrested for bringing underage girls into his home for illegal activity.

“Not all the media can be trusted equally to cover the story properly and to protect the victims, to not burn bridges,” Arvesu said, suggesting that service providers carefully choose the specific journalists they work with on human trafficking stories.

Nestor Yglesias of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, who has extensive experience helping the media cover the human trafficking story, said TV and video coverage of trafficking victims can be problematic. “Everyone wants to help get an interview with a victim but the concern I have is that anyone who is part of an active investigation and talking to the media could compromise the prosecution.”

“Sometimes visuals are not needed” to tell the story, he added.