{"id":159221,"date":"2017-01-18T08:36:22","date_gmt":"2017-01-18T13:36:22","guid":{"rendered":"\/news\/?p=159221"},"modified":"2018-05-30T15:55:45","modified_gmt":"2018-05-30T19:55:45","slug":"heres-what-happens-sex-trafficking-victims-taken-planned-parenthood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/heres-what-happens-sex-trafficking-victims-taken-planned-parenthood\/","title":{"rendered":"Here’s what happens to sex-trafficking victims who are taken to Planned Parenthood"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Victims of sex trafficking are sometimes taken to abortion facilities or Planned Parenthood centers for forced abortions by their pimps and, in some cases, the doctors they are taken to may have been clients of their pimps. This was revealed in a stunning report published by the Annals of Health Law in 2014 and entitled, Health Consequences of Sex Trafficking<\/a>, notes that survivors also had \u201csignificant contact with clinical treatment facilities, most notable Planned Parenthood<\/strong><\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Victims of sex trafficking taken to Planned Parenthood one-fourth of the time<\/p><\/div>\n

Survivors also stated<\/a> that they received other medical services from providers who knew they were being controlled by a pimp. Roughly two-thirds of survivors who specified a location for their abortions identified a clinic as the site of their abortion, indicating ongoing systemic problems inside the abortion industry. One survivor told the researchers that, \u201cI was under serious pressure from my pimps to abort the babies<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In addition, one-fourth of the places the victims identified as places they were taken for medical care was Planned Parenthood.<\/p>\n

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Planned Parenthood doesn’t ask questions about sex trafficking victims<\/p><\/div>\n

On the surface, this may\u00a0lead some to believe that Planned Parenthood centers are necessary, but, this theory can be contradicted by the words of one sex trafficking victim who told researchers that the reason she was taken to the abortion chain was because, “Planned Parenthood didn’t ask any questions<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

That may be because pimps are sometimes involved in the abortions committed on\u00a0these sex traffic victims. According to a national study<\/a> funded by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention of the U.S. Department of Justice, “A cross-sectional survey of female patients in five family-planning clinics (affiliated with Planned Parenthood) in Northern California found that of the 9% of young women (aged 16-29 years old) who sought services at these family planning clinics, 16% reported pimp involvement.”<\/p>\n

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Sex Trafficking, Forced Abortions, and Profit by the Abortion Industry<\/strong><\/p>\n

In one example published in the footnotes <\/a> of a report by the Virginia Journal of Criminal Law, authorities say that a victim of convicted<\/a> sex trafficker, Lenny Paul Haskins, forced her to undergo an abortion against her will and that, despite the victim’s protests and requests that she not be required to have an abortion, he paid for the abortion and was present when she was forcibly transported to the abortion provider.<\/p>\n

Senior advisor on Trafficking in Persons for the U.S. Department of State, Laura Lederer, conducted the study<\/a> in which 55 of 107 sex trafficking victims surveyed — or 55 percent — had at least one abortion. According to a report<\/a> in the DesMoines Register, thirty percent reported having multiple abortions, and one female respondent reported having 17. More than half of respondents said abortion was not their choice and they were ordered to abort by their traffickers.<\/p>\n

Women and girls are often taken to abortion clinics by their pimps or a person working for the pimp, a victim of the sex trafficking industry told Facing Life Now<\/a> TV. “Marlene,” who had become “trusted” by her pimp, told the interviewer that she was responsible for booking abortions when a woman became pregnant and noted that, “The pimps and the traffickers would get fake I.D.’s for the girls and we would take them to have abortions.”<\/p>\n

When asked if abortion clinics like Planned Parenthood would turn down the abortions for the girls, she replied, “Oh, no, absolutely not…honestly they had to know that these were teenagers, they were not adult women.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Marlene said that participating in these abortions traumatized her. She recalled a 14 year-old sex trafficked victim who became pregnant and was being forced to have an abortion: “So, I had the whole house raided — she was rescued,” she said.<\/p>\n

Cindy Collins, who works at a crisis pregnancy center in Louisiana and has worked with women who have been trafficked, told <\/a>the DesMoines Register that sex trafficking victims are often ordered to abort pregnancies by their traffickers. And, Nita Bells, regional director for Oregonians Against Trafficking Humans, told<\/a> Facing Life Now that, when it comes to forced abortions within the sex trafficking industry:\u00a0“The abortion industry is profiting tremendously…financially.”<\/p>\n

Abortion Doctors as Sex Trafficking Clients?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another disturbing fact is that even though abortion is supposed to be about ‘choice,’ survivors claim that they were given forced abortions at specific clinics where the abortion doctors may have been sex trafficking clients.<\/p>\n

As one victim in the study Health Consequences of Sex Trafficking<\/a> told researchers:<\/p>\n

\u201cI got pregnant six times and had six abortions during this time. Several of them were from a doctor who was a client <\/strong>—\u00a0he did them back door — I came in the back door after hours and paid them off the books. This kept my name off any records\u2026At least one of my abortions was from Planned Parenthood because they didn\u2019t ask any questions<\/strong>.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Planned Parenthood’s Dangerous Failure to Consistently Report<\/strong><\/p>\n

Tragically many of the victims of sex trafficking are minors who should be protected by mandatory reporting laws covering abortion and Planned Parenthood facilities (and are, in some states). If an underage child is being “pimped” and is then taken for an abortion or other medical service, personnel at\u00a0abortion clinics in some states are required to report them as suspected child abuse. Whether reporting is a requirement of the law or not, common sense and basic human decency should lead those who claim to care to do whatever is necessary to rescue girls and women in slavery. However, as Live Action has documented<\/a>\u00a0and trafficked girls have claimed,\u00a0Planned Parenthood often fails to report\u00a0suspected abuse<\/a> to authorities.<\/p>\n

In one of many Planned Parenthood clinics Live Action<\/a> visited during an undercover investigation, a New Jersey clinic manager warned the Live Action investigator, posing as a pimp, to have their trafficked underage girls lie about their age<\/strong> to avoid mandatory reporting laws.<\/p>\n