The New Hanover County Sheriff’s Office in Wilmington, N.C., announced in April 2023 that a six-month investigation by the Coastal Carolina Human Trafficking Task Force had ended with the arrest of six men charged with human trafficking. The involvement of at least 150 victims had been disclosed thus far.
From the New Hanover Sheriff’s statement:
“The charges were related to the criminal activity of Cape Fear Escorts/Entertainers. Cape Fear Escorts/Entertainers would recruit victims by promising them thousands of dollars for dancing, but would, in turn, have the victims engage in commercial sex and took proceeds from it. All these incidents took place in the New Hanover County Area.”
Estimates are that internationally human trafficking is a $150 billion industry annually. As the predators in this particular case go to jail, what can be done for the victims?
Cry Freedom Missions (CFM) a ministry of Wayne Pregnancy Center (WPC), rescues victims of sex trafficking and provides housing, work, mentoring, legal assistance, training and a new start, and is working closely with the victims in this case.
As the need to serve this population continues to grow CFM has expanded and added another location, while continuing to offer education and resources on trafficking to pregnancy help centers throughout the country, as well as consulting and collaborating with local, state, and federal law enforcement in this area.
With its new expansion CFM now offers a new level of help where they can house clients for two years and employ them essentially as long as necessary.
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Civic leaders encouraged CFM to seek grants and get government aid to expand. The center’s leaders didn’t agree.
CEO Beverly Weeks and COO Jonathan Chavous have trusted in and witnessed God’s provision to meet CFM’s expansion needs.
“Our Father owns the cattle on a thousand hills,” Weeks said. “When He gives you a vision, He will always provide the provision.”
The evidence of that provision is fruitful and evident.
CFM has an emergency safe house where individuals who have been trafficked can live for 30-60 days and following that there has been a separate long-term safe house where survivors can live for a year. CFM has also had a café and boutique where clients work to earn money and learn self-sufficiency. These operations also help underwrite the ministry.
CFM recently added a transitional home which adds an additional year of care, education, employment, and opportunities to build a new life.
Chavous explained the comprehensive approach of CFM’s housing ministry.
“To hear it, see it, feel it, experience it, they’re being loved and that is being done through excellence, through caring staff, through even how the safe house looks,” he said. “It’s beautiful, it looks like a nice resort.”
They also opened a second café and coffee shop.
All the support was fostered and made possible by the success CFM has already experienced.
The flagship Cry Freedom Missions Shoppe, which includes the new coffee shop and café, is in Goldsboro, a satellite office is in Sanford N.C., and a shop and office are in Roxboro N.C. The safe house and transitional homes are in undisclosed locales.
The CFM shoppes merchandise and coffee are available for on-line ordering. The merchandise includes survivor-made jewelry, gifts, handbags, home decor, art, and more.
WPC built a trusted reputation in the community by sending teams with material aid into hotels, where much of the trafficking is taking place, as well as to tent cities and other areas where transient communities exist, even the local woods.
They have a mobile unit so they can perform intakes and pregnancy tests as well while they are out in these areas.
There has been no shortage of client sources for CFM.
By visiting local prisons, they have been able to identify many trafficking victims. During their incarceration is an opportune time to build trust and offer services as they are separated from drug dealers and those who have trafficked them.
CFM began to conduct classes in the local jails and expanded across North Carolina. As they performed intakes on each female who came through the system, they encountered the astonishing statistic of 92% of the women who had had an abortion.
Of those in the prison 92% had also been exploited sexually.
“In many cases, the most broken in our society had the most abuse sexually in our society,” Chavous said. “And how do we reach them with the love of God? How can we bring them out of this horrible lifestyle, horrible abuse, in many cases this modern-day slavery?
He explained the goal for clients served by CFM.
“So, they can have hope again, they can have healthy lives, healthy families,” Chavous said. “Most of them, their one desire was to have somebody to love them so they can have a family, so they can have children one day. For many of them they never grew up in that environment.”
The clients they have served range in age from a 10-year-old who was pregnant and had been trafficked to trafficking victims in their late 40s.
“Most people involved in prostitution are being trafficked,” Chavous said. “They are being coerced and forced into it in order to have shelter and food and they take their I.D.s away from them. They are brainwashed into believing this is all they can do.”
“Their number one need is for a safe place to go,” he added.
Traffickers exploit the fact that pregnancy centers offer free services, Weeks said.
“That trafficker is going to take a girl to a place where they can receive free services or that young lady doesn’t have the money for services and so the pregnancy centers are on the frontline of being able to encounter these individuals,” she said.
CFM has been able to support law enforcement’s sting operations by providing vital information identifying victims. In turn law enforcement officials have helped with the safe passage of victims out of trafficking to the CFM safe house.
“What we’re finding out is that individuals who are actively in addiction, most of them have been sexually exploited in some way,” Weeks said. “They exchange sex for drugs, for food, for a place to stay.”
Offering a safe house has been the key, first offering an emergency shelter for a year before then adding the transitional housing.
The first phase involves medical care, getting an ID, identifying the best course of action, whether that is to return to their family or loved ones, drug rehabilitation, and then if needed a plan for long term care with CFM.
The case management team focuses on developing a plan for each client which could include legal help, educational services, and counseling to deal with trauma.
“The number one lie we are constantly battling is what their trafficker has convinced them,” Chavous said. “They tell them they are nothing but a prostitute.”
Through CFM’s various emergency services and housing, long-term programs, Bible studies, case management and the encouragement of mentors, these women have the opportunity to build trust with people who love them unconditionally and then receive the truth of their value in God’s eyes.
