South Carolina Injury Lawyer Blog

Your South Carolina car accident attorneys read an interesting article in yesterday's Post and Courier that discusses an alleged illegal sex trade in North Charleston. After weeks of alleged force enslavement and months under federal supervision a 20-year-old immigrant from just outside Mexico City will soon be able to return home because authorities no longer her to testify against a North Charleston woman arrested in connection with a suspected human trafficking case. The reason the immigrant woman is longer needed to testify is because the 28-year-old North Charleston woman, also originally from Mexico, plead guilty to one of the four charges against her.

The 28-year-old woman admitted in federal court, on Tuesday, to harboring an illegal immigrant. However, she did not admit to receiving any financial gain from concealing the 20-year-old. She faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison, a $250,00 fine, and three years of supervised release. If she had admitted to receiving financial gain from the illegal immigrant, she could have faced twice the amount of time in prison. Her sentencing hearing has yet to be determined.

For admitting to the harboring an illegal immigrant charge, prosecutors will dismiss the charges of importing an alien for an immoral purpose, bringing in and harboring aliens, transporting for prostitution, and failing to file a factual statement about an alien. Each of these charges carries a maximum prison sentence of 10 years, 3 years of supervised release, and a $250,000 fine.

Continue reading "Illegal Mexican Immigrant Harbored in North Charleston, Captor Accepts Plea Deal and Immigrant Allowed to Return Home" »

You see special reports and Dateline specials investigating human trafficking in the United States and internationally but you never think human trafficking is occurring in your state, much less in your city. South Carolina child injury lawyers want to you to know that South Carolina’s first human trafficking case has just been discovered.

Human trafficking is when a person, in most cases a minor, is taken against their will and forced to work or perform acts against their will. The trafficked person usually only receives a very small portion of the profit they earn, if they actually receive any profit at all. Many pimps or drug lords that traffic minors and citizens from other countries control traffic persons by taking them to a location they are unfamiliar with, making them reliant on their kidnapper. Unfortunately, United Nations officials have estimated that human trafficking profits $32 billion dollars around the world.

Columbia, South Carolina, the state’s capital is now the home of the state’s first human trafficking case. The child injury victim was a 14-year-old girl from Mexico. The girl was taken from Mexico and trafficked into the United States, where she then was held captive in a trailer a few miles outside of Columbia city limits. The girl called her sister in Mexico for help and tried to giver her a description of the trailer and her surroundings. The description was vague but her sister contacted Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

ICE agents investigated the lead for and put the trailer under surveillance. February 27, 2007, ICE agents and Richland County Police raided the trailer. When they knocked on the door, standard protocol before raiding a home, to their surprise the 14-year-old abused child answered the door. They lead the girl out of the trailer and into custody. Her abductors are currently in custody and awaiting trial.

Source: WIS 10 News, Columbia- “14-year-old girl was state’s first human trafficking case.” March 2, 2010.