Child Forced Labor in the United States

Video Description

To mark Human Trafficking Prevention Month, the D.C. Human Trafficking Task Force Labor Trafficking Subcommittee and the Human Trafficking Legal Center co-hosted a panel discussion on child forced labor in the United States. Watch this recording to hear from our expert panel about challenges to addressing child forced labor. The panel discussed policy recommendations to prevent these crimes and to hold perpetrators accountable. Panelists: Kenya K. Davis, Partner, Boies Schiller; Former Assistant United States Attorney, U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia Kenya K. Davis, a former Assistant United States Attorney, served for more than a decade as a federal prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia. In that role, Davis represented the United States as lead council in 35 jury trials, 15 bench trials, and several evidentiary hearings involving complicated issues of first impression. She and her team prevailed in convicting a trafficker of adult sex trafficking by force, fraud and coercion, in one of the first federal trials of its kind in the District of Columbia. Davis also handled more than 100 grand jury investigations and defended 13 verdicts before the D.C. Court of Appeals. She also served as co-chair of the D.C. Human Trafficking Task Force, a group of nearly 75 senior federal and local law enforcement officials, government agency leaders, and NGO executives, working to increase the prosecution of traffickers, provide comprehensive services to victims, and coordinate anti-trafficking efforts in the D.C. area. Davis is currently a partner at Boies Schiller, where she handles securities class actions, along with global civil laborand sex trafficking cases. She is a sought-after trial lawyer and advocate. Bella Hounakey, Program Management Specialist, Administration for Children and Families (ACF) Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) Bella Hounakey is a Program Management Specialist for the ACF ORR with specific expertise in child welfare, migration, and mental health. Hounakey has worked with unaccompanied children from Central and South America as well as unaccompanied refugee minors in foster care operations for over seven years. Prior to ORR, Hounakey was an Asylum Officer with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) under the Department of Homeland Security and a monitoring and evaluation specialist at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Hounakey holds a master's degree in social work from Western Michigan University and a bachelor's degree in Spanish and criminal justice from Western Michigan University. Ima Matul, Subject Matter Expert on Human Trafficking Ima Matul is an internationally recognized leader in the human trafficking movement. A survivor of child labor trafficking, she was born and raised in Indonesia. As a 17-year-old teenager, she was offered a job to work in the United States with a salary of $150 per month. When she arrived in Los Angeles, she was forced to work eighteen hours a day, with no day off for three years. Matul is a founding member and the former manager of the Survivor Leadership Program at the Coalition to Abolish Slavery & Trafficking (CAST). Matul has built a community and a network of human trafficking survivor leaders nationally. Together with the survivor network, she has made a profound impact on U.S. anti-trafficking efforts and policies. Kendra Ross, Consultant, The Human TraffickingLegal Center Kendra Ross is a survivor-leader in the anti-trafficking movement. She serves as a consultant and advisor to the Human Trafficking Legal Center. Ross, a survivor of child labor trafficking, advises the Human Trafficking Legal Center on policy issues and public outreach. Ross uses her expertise as a survivor to advise attorneys on trauma-informed advocacy and support for victims of human trafficking. Ross recently met with D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine to brief him on labor trafficking of U.S. citizens. Moderated by: Evelyn Chumbow, Operations Manager and Survivor Advocate, The Human Trafficking Legal Center Evelyn Chumbow is a survivor of child labor trafficking turned anti-trafficking advocate and public speaker. She focuses her life’s work on ending modern-day slavery. Chumbow has been invited to brief several government agencies about human trafficking from a survivor’s perspective, including the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, the State Department, and the Department of Justice. She was appointed by President Obama to serve on the U.S. Advisory Council on Human Trafficking. She was an invited speaker at the 2019 Paris Peace Forum and the 2014 Thomson Reuters Foundation Trust Women Conference. In 2016, she traveled to Cameroon to brief the Freedom for All conference on best practices for supporting trafficking survivors returning home from the Middle East, with an emphasis on creating opportunities for gainful employment.