Myths about human trafficking during the Super Bowl explained

BRYAN, Texas (KBTX) – The Super Bowl is just three days away and some people have questioned whether the Super Bowl has been linked to an increase in human trafficking.

Despite the belief human trafficking peaks across the country during Super Bowl weekend, Unbound Now Outreach Coordinator, Christine Labertew, says there’s no data to back up that claim.

“There’s no hard and fast evidence showing that it does, however, there’s evidence that shows that it does not either,” said Labertew.

However, Unbound Now’s Task Force Coordinator, Kellye Arnold, says during large events like the Super Bowl, law enforcement increases their efforts and presence.

“What we do know is that law enforcement agencies in those areas tend to have more concerted efforts and more operations that occur surrounding the Super Bowl which can cause a spike in the data in the number of arrests and the number of recoveries, but were not sure yet whether that is related to the actual Super Bowl or if it’s not,” said Arnold.

At events that draw large crowds, Arnold says with more officers and more people, arrests in general go up.

“We’ll hear later on ‘We did an operation we did surrounding this event to combat human trafficking and this is how many people we arrested, this is how many potential victims we recovered,’ and so by having that information, we know that it occurred around the Super Bowl, but that doesn’t negate the fact that human trafficking is occurring in those towns the rest of the year. It just means the officers are being deployed in other ways, so they’re not making the same number of arrests or making the same number of recoveries for the rest of the year,” said Arnold.

In the Brazos Valley and surrounding counties, they say the most vulnerable are targeted.

“Traffickers prey on vulnerabilities and if they find that one vulnerability to exploit, the next thing you know, someone might be being trafficked either in sex or labor trafficking,” said Arnold.

For them, it’s a fight that happens every day. While they don’t necessarily increase their efforts during Super Bowl weekend, Unbound Now works 24/7, 365 days a year to be a resource and fight against human trafficking.

“We are going to give the effort because we have the ability to give the effort every single day,” said Arnold.

“We have 6 full-time advocates that our in our office, they answer our crisis line 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for Brazos County as well as our surrounding counties and that is a constant,” said Labertew.

If you know someone needing help, call 979-985-2430 or click here.