Human Trafficking Crime Reporting

• In Event: Detecting and Measuring Human Trafficking Violations

Abstract

Despite public attention to the problem of human trafficking it has proven difficult to reliably measure the magnitude of the problem. To improve the quality of information about human trafficking, in 2013 the Federal Bureau of Investigation incorporated human trafficking offenses in the Uniform Crime Reporting program. However, there are many reasons to expect the UCR program to greatly underreport human trafficking in the U.S. Research on police identification of human trafficking confirms that law enforcement agencies across the U.S. have limited knowledge about the crime of human trafficking, face significant challenges identifying human trafficking and distinguishing it from other crimes and lack procedures necessary to ensure effective investigations. Even when law enforcement agencies correctly identify victims and investigate crimes of human trafficking, human trafficking cases may not be accurately represented in official data sources. Changes to the UCR program are rare and any newly defined offense will take time and resources for local agencies to integrate the changes into well-engrained UCR program policies and procedures. This paper utilizes data from a multi-method study to examine how well reported human trafficking crimes represent the true prevalence of human trafficking problems in three study communities.

Authors

• Amy Farrell, Northeastern University

• Jack McDevitt, Northeastern University

• Shea W. Cronin, Boston University

• Meredith Dank, Urban Institute

• Colleen Owens, Urban Institute