Rachael Rollins, US Attorney for Massachusetts, spoke at a School of Law symposium on human trafficking on February 11. Photo by Suzanne Kreiter/the Boston Globe via Getty Images

Business & Law

US Attorney for Massachusetts Rachael Rollins Focuses on Victims of Human Trafficking at LAW Symposium

Rollins wants to hear their stories and their experiences in the legal system: “I actually shut up and listen”

Rachael Rollins, the US Attorney for Massachusetts, could be meeting with her small army of federal prosecutors or on the phone with her boss, US Attorney General Merrick B. Garland, but if a victim of human trafficking wants to talk with her, she will make herself immediately available. 

It is part of her victim- and survivor-centered approach to criminal cases, especially ones involving human trafficking, Rollins said when she delivered the keynote address on Friday at a virtual trafficking symposium hosted by BU’s School of Law and its Public Interest Law Journal. (Rollins will also be LAW’s 2022 Convocation speaker on May 22.)

“I want victims and survivors to know that they matter, that we acknowledge their trauma and the harm they have endured at the highest levels, and that we intend to do right by them,” said Rollins, who was sworn in as US Attorney for the District of Massachusetts in January 2022, the first Black person to serve in that position. “I actually shut up and listen and give them an opportunity, if they are comfortable, to tell me, as the US attorney, the federal prosecutor in our commonwealth, what they want me to hear about their experiences in the criminal legal [system], while they were being harmed, or any contact they’ve had with the system I’m involved in.” 

Human trafficking—or modern-day slavery, as it is widely known—refers to a crime where traffickers exploit, and profit from, adults or children by compelling them to perform labor or engage in commercial sex. While data are hard to come by, as victims fear retribution for coming forward and rarely have access to attorneys, the US Department of State estimates that 24.9 million adults and children around the world are trafficked at any given time. Globally, human trafficking generates an estimated $150 billion a year, according to the State Department’s most recent data.

Here in the US, the Department of Health and Human Services reported that in 2020 the National Human Trafficking Hotline identified 11,193 potential cases, responded to 13,129 signals from potential victims, and reported 3,353 cases to law enforcement. That’s more than 30 potential cases identified per day, and the COVID-19 pandemic has only made the situation worse–with the Hotline reporting an increase in crisis cases and requests for shelter as well as information about workers’ rights — giving an even greater urgency to the work Rollins hopes to achieve.

Formerly the Suffolk County district attorney—the first woman and the first woman of color to be elected to that position—Rollins was nominated as US Attorney by President Biden last July, and confirmed by the US Senate in December. When she took office in January, she announced that one of her top priorities would be helping to reduce the trafficking of people for sex and labor.

“This has long been an important concern for me,” Rollins said at Friday’s symposium. “As DA, I spent countless hours making sure I was available to meet with victims.” As US Attorney, she went on, “I plan on significantly expanding our efforts with human trafficking, increasing resources to handle more cases, assisting as many survivors as possible.” 

While her office has worked with more than 100 victims of trafficking, Rollins said that statistics tell only part of the human trafficking story. Her office has helped victims navigate a range of problems and challenges, she said, involving mental health and medical care, substance use, housing, parenting issues, education, and jobs. 

“I think we understand the significant toll these cases take on the individuals trafficked and their families, and we recognize the long path they may face in reclaiming their lives,” she said. 

The day before the symposium, longtime trafficker Bruce Brown, who was prosecuted by Rollins’ office for trafficking four people, one of whom was a minor, was sentenced to 12 years in prison. One of Brown’s victims died of an overdose while his case was pending. “She wasn’t able to be there to confront the person who harmed her, used her, and exploited her,” Rollins said. “The trauma she endured likely played into her pain and possibly her substance use as well. It’s our job as prosecutors to speak for her and communicate to the court her perseverance and strength. All these victims are remarkable in their ability to overcome harm, deception, and the stigmatization that comes with the trauma they’ve endured. We need to start speaking out and stigmatizing the trafficker, not the trafficked.” 

It’s also important, Rollins said, to affirm projects like the LAW symposium. 

Organized by the BU Public Interest Law Journal, the all-day event—Human Trafficking, Then and Now: New Directions and Approaches to Exploitation—explored intersectional, trauma-informed, multidisciplinary, and non-carceral approaches to trafficking prevention. The panel speakers included several LAW clinical associate professors of law, among them Julie Dahlstrom, who directs LAW’s Immigrants’ Rights & Human Trafficking Program (IRHT); Sarah Sherman Stokes, IRHT associate director; and Karen Pita Loor, associate dean for experiential education and Michaels Faculty Research Scholar. 

Among the other panelists were Jasmine Gonzales Rose, a LAW professor; Heba Gowayed, BU’s Moorman-Simon Assistant Professor of Sociology; Elizabeth Keeley, chief of the human trafficking division of the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office, and Timothy Moran, an assistant US attorney in Rollins’ office. 

Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey welcomed the panelists in a video, and LAW Dean Angela Onwuachi-Willig gave the opening address. 

“Human trafficking is a global problem that requires a global solution,” said Onwuachi-Willig, BU’s Ryan Roth Gallo & Ernest J. Gallo Professor of Law. “Unfortunately, in recent years, the United States has not wielded its influence on the global stage to prioritize the human trafficking crisis on an international scale.”

Onwuachi-Willig criticized the policies under Donald Trump, which she said “undermined systems of protection,” making trafficking survivors more vulnerable to exploitation. “As victims’ advocates, we must repair the damage that has been done over the past several years and restore the safety and humanity of all survivors of human trafficking.”

LAW students and faculty have collaborated with Attorney General Healey and others, the dean said, “to build tools that enable frontline responders to identify labor trafficking survivors and ensure that they receive trauma-informed comprehensive services.” And, she said, the Immigrants’ Rights & Human Trafficking Clinic has worked with attorneys and legislators to pass state statutes to provide post-conviction relief for trafficking survivors in Massachusetts and to require that all state and local officials have a policy in place to help immigrant survivors of crime with visa certification. 

Madison Bush (LAW‘22), the Public Interest Law Journal’s symposium editor, and Kennedy Barber-Fraser (LAW’22), the journal’s editor-in-chief, helped organize the human trafficking event. The journal will publish a special symposium issue in spring 2022. 

Symposium sponsors: Pardee School Initiative on Forced Migration and Human Trafficking; BU Spark! the Human Trafficking Institute; the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office, and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr.