By Dave Dahl
SPRINGFIELD – Human trafficking is not a vestige of some other time or place — or a bad movie. Forced labor and modern-day slavery are real, says a Downstate Congressman who convened a roundtable in Springfield Wednesday.
“We heard from our hotel owners and people who work at bus stops,” U.S. Rep. Darin LaHood (R-Dunlap) told reporters after the closed-door event. “Also, our highways — you think about (Interstates) 55 and 72 that intersect here in Springfield and how those thoroughfares are avenues that are used for human trafficking.”
A Downstate agency trying to meet the problem head-on is the Peoria-based Center for Prevention of Abuse. Director Carol Merna says those college-age students going door-to-door selling “educational materials” are sometimes the victims, stripped of their driver’s licenses and paperwork and left behind if they don’t hit their marks.
Dave Dahl can be reached at news@wjbc.com.
