Two survivors of human trafficking, their advocates and a Quinnipiac law student are working to pass an amendment to a Connecticut law that would allow survivors to clear their records of charges and convictions they acquired because they were being trafficked.
The current Connecticut vacatur statute, allows for victims of human trafficking to vacate convictions related to prostitution if the conviction is related to being trafficked. The proposed amendment would allow victims to vacate any charge — not just prostitution— that resulted from the trafficking, including drug charges, failure to appear in court or other crimes.
Cynthia Lill, a third-year law student at Quinnipiac, has worked to train some public defenders in Connecticut on how to spot victims of human trafficking when they enter the criminal justice system charged on other crimes. Once the victim is identified, Lill said, it will be easier for defenders to argue that their charges are a result of the abuse they suffered at the hands of a trafficker.
“We are advocating for common sense legislation that would allow people to set aside their criminal convictions beyond prostitution convictions if they can show they are being trafficked or have been trafficked,” Lill said at the second, “Understanding Human Trafficking Series” webinar held at the Quinnipiac School of Law.
With Lill’s help, the Quinnipiac School of Law Civil Justice Clinic proposed the legislation, which is now being championed in the state legislature by Representative Jillian Gilchrest, a Democrat from West Hartford.
“We are looking in Connecticut to pass a law to allow for vacatur for all trafficking related charges — not just the traditional prostitution, but drug related charges, and I would like to see us include trafficking itself,” Gilchrest said. “We know that sometimes a victim of human trafficking will be forced to solicit other women or men to participate in this crime.”
In 2016, the Connecticut State Legislature was meant to correct the issue, but failed to include any other charges other than prostitution.
“This is an attempt to go back and right the wrongs of our past to ensure that victims of human trafficking have this vacatur component,” Gilchrest said.
Theresa Rozyn and Sharifa Abdullah, two survivors of human trafficking said a law like this would have helped them as they were attempting to rebuild their lives after being victimized. While both women eventually were cleared of charges that resulted from being trafficked, the process wasn’t easy without a statute like the one Lill and Gilchrest are working to pass.
“For every single crime I was convicted of, I had to write a couple of paragraphs saying where I was, what happened and why did that play out,” said Rozyn, who went through the pardon process. “Those are great questions to ask for one. I had to do 44 of those. Each one of them I had to beg for forgiveness. That includes prostitution and criminal trespass.”
For Rozyn, who is now a co-founder of The Underground, an anti-trafficking advocacy group, going through the effort to change the law is worth it if it helps just one other person.
“None of this is in vain if one person can be helped,” Rozyn said. “If one person walks away and can say ‘I am not a prostitute,’ all of this will change my life. It has already.”
Rozyn and Abdullah were trafficked as minors. Neither of them realized at the time that what they were being asked to do to make money was trafficking and they found little to no support in the criminal justice system as they were suffering.
As a result, when Rozyn got out of jail on one charge, she would find herself alone and broke. In a fit of desperation, she would turn for support back to her trafficker, who in turn would motivate her to commit more crimes.
“You will pay for that arrest,” Rozyn said. “You will be starved. The most horrific acts that no one will do, she will be faced to do. You will do all of that and there’s no one trying to pull me out of that dark light. There’s a seat for me and it says prostitute.”
Abdullah agreed that in her experiences, she often felt like there was no one to turn to who she could trust.
“If I didn’t hurry up and get back out after that arrest? I had to hurry up and get that quota,” Abdullah said. “I am being beaten up in an alley. Who is gonna come, the cops? Are they going to arrest someone for hurting me? No, they are going to take me to jail.”
Even worse, Rozyn said that sometimes she would be asked to “service” the police officers who promised that he would let her go if she did what he asked.
“The joke is, he took me to jail anyway,” Rozyn said. “You can hear them laughing about it as they took me to the cell.”
After years of feeling like the entire world was against them, Rozyn and Abdullah met real advocates. Ann-Marie Boulay, founder and CEO of The Underground, became a support system for Rozyn and Leigh Latimer, who helped to establish the Exploitation Intervention Project, became an advocate for Abdullah.
“About seven years ago, Sharifa and I met because she was arrested for prostitution,” Latimer said. “I was assigned to her case and as I reviewed the papers from her case I saw over 10 years prior she had a series of arrests over a four year period for prostitution and in the middle of that, an arrest for criminal possession of a controlled substance.”
Latimer quickly began to suspect that Abdullah had been trafficked.
“We got to know each other, established a relationship of confidence and I began talking to Sharifa about her experience,” Latimer said. “Those prostitution convictions were related to her trafficking.”
With Latimer’s help, Abdullah filed a motion to vacate the charges. Latimer said this is an exhausting legal process for any victim.
“Almost every client has told me these are memories they have consciously pushed away. Now I am in a room with them asking them to bring them all back so we can do the motion,” Latimer said. “It requires a lot of commitment to the proces.”
The possession of a controlled substance charge was found to be intricately related to Abdullah being trafficked and in the end the prosecutor decided to vacate all of the charges — not just the prostitution charges that were covered under the law in New York, where Abdullah was being charged.
This decision was made on an individual basis for Abdullah, but it changed her life. She now serves as an advisory board member for the Exploitation Intervention Project and is devoting her life to making sure more survivors have the chance to vacate the charges against them.
“We’re here now so none of that happens anymore,” Abdullah said.