A new report from the Human Trafficking Institute unveils new data about how federal courts handle trafficking cases nationwide and in Arizona.
The report uses data from human trafficking prosecutions in all 50 states, four territories and Washington, D.C. It breaks cases into two main categories — those related to sex trafficking and those related to forced labor.
The data showed there was an overall decline in the total number of reported trafficking victims nationwide between 2020 and 2021. But forced labor cases were up by 20%.
Arizona filed three new criminal sex trafficking cases in federal court last year, according to the data, and convicted one defendant. In that case, the court did not order the defendant convicted to pay restitution and restitution calculations were not undertaken because there was not a victim identified. The report found federal courts handling Arizona cases had not ordered a defendant to pay restitution to a victim since 2016.
