July 21 - Club Meeting

Mike Spellman arranged for us to view a YouTube video today, featuring Rebecca Bender.  Rebecca has been recognized by a number of Rotary clubs in the U.S. for her work with victims of human trafficking.  The video was taped when she was a guest speaker at a Rotary Forum on this subject held at the RI International Convention in 2017.  Forum members included U.S. Senator Bob Corker and actor Ashton Kutcher who is an activist in this area also.  Rebecca told her own gripping story of how she became a victim of sex trafficking.  She was an honor student and athlete in high school in a small town in Oregon.  But, the summer after graduating she became pregnant and gave birth to a daughter.  She started college as planned but soon found herself struggling because her life was so different from her college peers.  At this point, she met a man who provided all the emotional support she was looking for.  After six months, he suggested they take a trip to Las Vegas and this is where her nightmare began.  Her boyfriend suddenly became her pimp.  She was trapped in this life for the next six years, enduring many forms of abuse including two men tattooing their names into her back.  She was freed when their operation was raided by federal agents.  Although this allowed her to move forward with her life, she continued to struggle for a time in her new circumstances of poverty, homelessness and feelings of hopelessness while trying to provide for her now 8 year old daughter.  However, she slowly began finding ways to use her experience to help others . She became founder and CEO of Elevate Academy, a non-profit that works with law enforcement, FBI, Homeland Security and aftercare programs to provide expert testimony, training and consultation on this issue of social justice across the globe.  One of Rebecca's key messages is that we must understand that this crime takes on many forms.  Not all victims are kidnapped.  Many are slowly lured into the life by trusted men in their lives who become expert at this form of grooming as a means to acquire new "assets" for their trade.