People caught up in human trafficking are finally being treated as victims, not criminals, according to Susan Peters, the founder and global director of Unbound Global.

“I think it used to be basically the narrative of the past is that someone who is in prostitution, the police would view as someone they would arrest and charged with prostitution,” Peters told Lone Star Standard.

That has started to change in the last few years, she said.

“The police have gotten a lot more training [and] there's a lot more awareness in the community, so it is changing," Peters said. "I think in the last five years particularly. There's still a long way to go and there's still a lot more awareness and training that needs to happen, particularly in central Texas. Our law enforcement is not arresting the victims.”

Amanda Nonamaker is an example of a victim who battled abuse, addiction and despair. Police did not believe she was a sex trafficking victim.

Nonamaker was kidnapped, raped and sold into sex slavery by her then-boyfriend. In a recent interview with FOX 4, she said the trauma of being trafficked caused her to lose custody of her son and fall deeper into a cycle of meth addiction.

After running away from her captors, Nonamaker called the police. They did not believe she was a victim of human trafficking.

“I’m scared to talk to the police because of what I just went through,” she told FOX 4. “He [the officer] tells me I’m acting funny because I didn’t want to get close to him. I was asking him for police evidence to prove to me that he was a cop, and he pointed to a plastic star on his collar.”

Nonamaker said the police ignored her plea for a rape kit upon their arrival at the station.

“They threw me in the holding tank,” she said. “I told them how I needed a rape kit done. I’ve been raped. They still didn’t take me to the emergency room to get a rape kit. They completely dismissed everything I said.”

After eventually being released from the police station, Nonamaker found refuge in a Texas women’s shelter. Hoping to regain custody of her son, she began rehabilitation for her meth addiction. But then her trafficker discovered her location, and Nonamaker had to relocate to Missouri for her own safety.

In a recent interview with FOX 4, Nonamaker says she has been drug-free for three years and has reunited with her son with the help of victim services.

When discussing how to move past the evils of trafficking and addiction, she said it’s a matter of making the right decision.

“You have to choose. I know it can be hard, but you have to choose for yourself that you don’t want this,” Nonamaker told FOX 4. “You have to choose to go through the help that you need. Whether you have somebody with you or not, your life is in your control.”

Peters said there is a growing understanding across the nation that many people involved in sex work are unwilling captives. Her organization served 352 victims last year, most caught up in prostitution.

The majority were females between 15 and 25, but they do work with girls and women who are older or younger. They also have assisted boys and men used by sex traffickers.

“Human trafficking victims can come from any socioeconomic class, any race any gender. Traffickers seek them out and pinpoint their vulnerabilities,” Peters said. “We've had a couple of victims from very well-established homes, but the vulnerability might be loneliness, a learning disability, doesn't easily connect with friends, and a trafficker can fake a friendship to lure them away.

“But a majority of the ones we see the vulnerability is not having that home environment, high percentage of foster children or single-family homes where there is poverty, possibly incarceration of a family member,” she added. “Not a father present. There are vulnerabilities of their basic needs not being met. A trafficker can come in and try to provide those.”

Peters said sex traffickers are able to spot a potential victim. It’s like they have a sixth sense that alerts them to vulnerable people.

“Oh, absolutely," she said. "And it's crazy. You can go on Amazon and order books on how to be a pimp. Yeah, it's horrible. Horrible. It literally will say, go up to a group of kids. Now look for the one that's a little detached. Tell her she's pretty. If she looks away, she's not used to it.

“She looks, like, ‘Whatever.’ You know, that's not the one. They're more secure, and you're going after the insecure one immediately,” Peters added. “They have a radar for going after the most vulnerable and the easier ones to manipulate.”

She said traffickers aren’t a uniform group.

“Mostly men, but there are a few women," Peters said. "And they can be anything from a single trafficker to a sophisticated organization to a businessperson,” Peters said. “They keep them in line in different ways, but the main way we see is through relationships. There's a term called trauma bonding, where they kind of mix love and connection and affection with brutality, coercion and manipulation. 

"It's the brain's way of surviving," she said. "They get very connected and loyal to that perpetrator or trafficker in this case, and that strengthens that bond to where they stay for a long time.”

There are other ways they force a victim to remain with them, Peters said.

“Or it could be a threat of violence to one of their family members. We’ve had that or they are violent with someone within their group,” she said. “They use that as an example to put fear in them. But it's also a way of building connection and a fake family connection for a lot of people who don’t have that and that can keep them.”

Substance abuse and addiction also play a role.

Peters said the trafficker will give victims drugs, expose them to pornography and sexualized behavior and slowly adapt them to this dangerous lifestyle. Soon, the victims are used as prostitutes to make money for their captors, with daily sex clients.

“We've seen them anywhere from two to three a day to 15 to 20 a day,” Peters said.

The women are highly traumatized, both physically and psychologically.

“Recovery is absolutely brutal," Peters said. "Unfortunately, just dealing with the trauma even after they get out.”

Suicidal thoughts and attempts often follow. Even after victims are rescued and try to build a new life, the past is close behind.

“It’s very difficult because of just the difficulty that they've been through emotionally, physically, relationally, financially,” Peters said. “There’s so many obstacles." 

She said that’s one reason it’s important for law enforcement agencies to treat these people as victims, not criminals.

“Absolutely. We're thrilled at the support we get from our law enforcement partners and our government agencies that support us,” Peters said.

From the federal to the local level, people in justice and law enforcement are aware of the need to support victims.

“The scourge of human trafficking is the modern-day equivalent of slavery, brutally depriving victims of basic human rights and essential physical needs as it erodes their sense of dignity and self-worth,” then-Attorney General William Barr said in a September 2020 news release. “The Department of Justice is relentless in its fight against the perpetrators of these heinous crimes," he said. "Working with state and local law enforcement and community victim service providers, we will continue to bring these criminals to justice and deliver critical aid to survivors.”

On Dec. 3, the Biden administration announced an updated National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking.

“The plan draws on survivor voices and recommendations over the years on how to prevent human trafficking and provide the appropriate resources to protect and respond to the needs of individuals who have experienced human trafficking,” according to a release from the White House.

According to a 2016 report from the University of Texas at Austin, there are 78,996 minor and youth victims of human trafficking and 234,457 victims of labor trafficking in Texas at any given time, totaling 313,453 victims of human trafficking.

Peters said the public can help rescue victims and bring traffickers to justice.

“I think we just have to constantly be doing awareness campaigns so that the general public is aware of the signs of trafficking and they know what to do when they see something,” she said. 

Unbound Global has Texas offices in Waco, Houston, Bryan College Station, and one opening in January in Austin. It also has offices in Mongolia, Indonesia, South Africa and Cambodia, Peters said.

“We are opening a specialized, short-term home for girls in foster care who have experienced sexual exploitation this summer in Waco,” she said. “We also opened a drop-in center during COVID-19 and have seen over 200 youth in one year."

Peters, 57, has been involved in this effort for 10 years. It’s not the career she had planned.

“I was a communication major at Baylor University and I worked in management for a few years and then on staff at a community church for a long time and traveled internationally to go check out our missionaries, and that’s where I saw human trafficking in almost every nation I visited and just thought, ‘I’ve got to do something about it,’” she said. 

According to the Unbound website, a person is a human trafficking victim if:

• They are not free to come or go. 
• Someone is withholding documentation (ID, visa, passport) or money from them.
• They were recruited to your work through false promises. 
• They are being threatened or abused on the job. 
• They work excessively long hours with no breaks. 
• They are made to live in their working establishment. 
• They are unpaid or paid very little. 
• They are working in the commercial sex industry and are younger than 18 or have a manager/pimp.
• They are being forced, threatened or manipulated to provide sexual acts.