Human trafficking group discusses Safe at Home

The law only lists crimes related to trafficking.

By Will Guldin

Published Dec. 9, 2008

Correction appended

The Central Missouri Stop Human Trafficking Coalition held its monthly board meeting Thursday at Stephens College and discussed an identity protection program as well as the organization's upcoming events.

Brenda Sites, program manager of the Missouri Secretary of State's Safe at Home Program, gave the group a presentation about Safe at Home, which was implemented through legislation in August 2007 and is aimed at protecting the identity of victims of crime.  

The organization contacted Sites to learn if victims of human trafficking could use the program.

Sites said that in order to qualify for the program, the victim "has to have good reason to believe" they are the victim of domestic abuse, rape, sexual assault or stalking and fears further violent acts. 

Safe at Home simply provides a post office box in Jefferson City where all of the mail for the participants is sent. The mail is then sorted and sent to the participants' new addresses. 

These addresses are confidential and this allows people to receive all of their mail without anyone knowing their street address. Sites said about 250 people are involved in the program, including adults and children. 

CMSHTC originally contacted Sites because Deb Hume, co-chair of CMSHTC, said "the program seems like a really good idea and I think it really could be useful and relevant to human trafficking even in its current form."

Sites said that, in its existing form, the wording of the law doesn't include victims of human trafficking, but said crimes mentioned in the legislation are often committed in conjunction with human trafficking.

"Safe at Home can help these victims because even though the statute reads 'victims of domestic violence, rape, sexual assault, and stalking' in a lot of instances victims of trafficking also experience these crimes," Sites said. "If that's the case then they could be eligible for the program." 

Any change in the wording of the Safe at Home program would require new legislation, but Hume said she isn't sure that a measure that drastic would be necessary.

"We would like to spend some time researching what other states have put in place," Hume said.

She also said the organization would consult the secretary of state's policy analysts and see how human trafficking legislation could be improved.

"We don't want to recommend that the law needs changing or that the program needs to be expanded because we don't know that it does," Hume said. 

After Sites finished with her presentation, the focus of the meeting shifted to discussions about upcoming events. On Wednesday, the organization will host a Human Rights Day celebration at the Columbia Public Library. The celebration will mark the 60th anniversary of the passage of the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights. 

Another event that was discussed at the meeting is the upcoming Anti-Human Trafficking Conference. The conference is scheduled for March 6 and will be similar to last year's, which was hosted by Stop Traffic, a student organization at MU, but smaller in scope. 

Jennifer Kimball, an MU senior and co-founder of CMSHTC, said the events will focus around education and training to help people identify human trafficking.