WASHINGTON, D.C. – Child sex trafficking affects an estimated 100,000 American children each year in the U.S. but Florida is fighting back. Florida improved its laws to address child sex trafficking every year since 2011. Today, anti-trafficking organization Shared Hope International released its fourth annual study on the state of child sex trafficking laws in America. The research found that Florida scored an 87.5 per cent on the report, up from 71.5 per cent in 2011. The improvements in Florida’s law reflect the commitment of key stakeholders in addressing the issue.  Watch the release of the state grades.

“Florida is determined to end the trafficking of our kids,” Representative Gayle Harrell (FL-83) said.  “Shared Hope’s report card for Florida provides guidance to help keep us on track with keeping our kids safe from the predators who seek to steal their innocence.  We will be examining the report carefully and introducing legislation to make our laws even stronger.”

While Florida has made substantial law changes in four years, the state has more work to do. Earning nearly a perfect score on most categories of the assessment, Florida must strengthen criminal provisions addressing demand and protective provisions for child victims. Florida’s human trafficking statute provides substantial penalties for buyers, individuals who purchase sex acts from minors and fuel the sex trafficking industry by making it a profitable market. However, in a recent study by Shared Hope International which documented criminal justice outcomes for buyers of sex acts with minors in four target site locations, no buyers were convicted under state sex trafficking laws. Florida offers other applicable laws for buyers, including “Lewd or lascivious battery” which carries a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison but only if the minor is younger than 16. Buyers who purchase sex with 16 or 17-year-old minors only face up to 60 days in prison under Florida’s “patronizing a prostitute” statute, failing to protect victims and deter those who seek to purchase sex with minors.

The Protected Innocence Challenge was first conducted in 2011 and found 26 states earned failing scores. However, after four years of sweeping legislative advancements, 42 states have raised their grade. Three states, Louisiana, Tennessee and Washington, have earned “A” grades. Only nine states have not raised their grade since 2011 and California, Maine, Michigan and South Dakota are the only remaining states earning failing scores. 

WASHINGTON, D.C., Child sex trafficking affects an estimated 100,000 American children each year in the U.S. This staggering statistic may be one of the few that could cause political adversaries to become issue allies. Jim Daly, president of Focus on the Family, an evangelical Christian ministry, was inspired by an interview with Shared Hope International on the issue of sex trafficking and decided to team up with Ted Trimpa, president of Trimpa Group LLC, a Democratic political consulting and government relations firm specializing in progressive policy advocacy, to advocate for stronger human trafficking laws. 

The pair was able to successfully advocate for the passage of House Bill 1273, which makes it easier to prosecute offenders, strengthens penalties for human trafficking convictions and creates a council within the Department of Public Safety to address the problem. This new law resulted in a significant score increase for Colorado on an annual report by Shared Hope International that grades each state on the sufficiency of its laws that relate to sex trafficking. In 2014, Colorado raised its grade from a “D” to “B” and is one of only three states in the nation to improve its score so significantly to raise two grade levels. Colorado earned 13 points for improvements in all six areas of evaluation, including criminalization of domestic minor sex trafficking, criminal provisions for traffickers, buyers and facilitators, protective provisions for child victims, and criminal justice tools for investigation and prosecution. Watch the release of the state grades.

“Americans may hold different ideas on many issues, but sex trafficking is an issue that crosses party lines, religious affiliations and gender divides,” President and Founder of Shared Hope International Linda Smith said. “No one wants to see a predator get away with stealing the innocence of our kids.

Shared Hope International launched the Protected Innocence Challenge in 2011 to advocate for stronger state laws to activate the nearly 30,000 state prosecutors across the nation. Previously, many states relied on federal statutes to address the crime; yet, many trafficking crimes were not accepted for federal prosecution, forcing states to handle the cases locally and relying on weak or insufficient laws. Over half the nation earned failing scores on the inaugural 2011 report card. Since then, 42 states have raised their grade and today only 4 states are earning failing grades.