Victimization can happen to anyone, and if certain factors exist, the risk of being trafficked through prolonged victimization increases tremendously. In the case of Sara, being forced into prostitution and continuously abused is what led her to becoming an offender. Larry J. Siegal, in his book, Criminology: The Core, explains the factors which leads to victimization and to committing crime through these theories: the victim precipitation theory, lifestyle theory, deviant place theory and the routine activities theory. These theories along with some mental disorders are apparent in the case of Sara Kruzan, with the Deviant Place Theory and the Routine Activities Theory being more prevalent. Although severely victimized, Kruzan became an offender …show more content…
Sara Kruzan, now age 38, is on parole after serving an 18-year sentence for the first-degree murder, later reduced to second-degree manslaughter, of her former pimp George Gilbert Howard. Just as the Deviant Place Theory states, most of the time, it is the deviant neighborhoods that one grows up in which creates a victim, rather than the victim putting themselves in dangerous situations through active precipitation. Kruzan’s becoming of a forced sex worker started out in a poor and transient neighborhood. Kruzan grew up around Riverside, California which is notorious for crime. FBI data states that Riverside, California hits a 15 out …show more content…
Howard was a pimp who lured Kruzan in by offering money, hope, and restoration. In exchange for Howard’s ‘kind’ gestures, he sexually molested Kruzan and trapped her into sexual exploitation until the age of sixteen. A research study done by Columbia Law Review found that violent pimp-controlled prostitution is the most dominant form of sex trafficking in the United States. They also found that traffickers will target young victims at middle schools or high schools, because they are more easy to manipulate (Bernard, 2014, p. 1468). Researchers of the Routine Activities Theory, Lawrence Cohen and Marcus Felson, describe how it was possible for Kruzan to continue to be a victim through certain living arrangements such as “(1) Proximity to criminals, … (3) target attractiveness, and (4) guardianship” (Siegel, 2017, p. 79) Kruzan’s immediacy to offenders drove her risk to be a victim. It was her attractiveness as a young girl which drew Howard to choose her as his victim, and she was “without friends or family to watch or help her” (Siegel, 2017, p.
Lisa Barnes Lampman's book "God And The Victim: Theological Reflections On Evil, Victimization, Justice, And Forgiveness" discusses the concept of crime and how it can be seen from a spiritual perspective. The writer is concerned about having people adopt a theological attitude in trying to understand crime and what triggers it. Victimization is also a principal concept in the book, as the writer relates to it in regard to crime and apparently wants to emphasize the fact that it is common for some people to consider themselves vulnerable to crime. The writer basically wants her readers to acknowledge that crime can have damaging consequences for society as a whole.
Theresa Flores, a girl from Detroit, was 15 years old when a boy she had a crush on from school offered her a ride home. Instead of taking her home he brought her back to his house where he insisted she come in. Red flags went off in Theresa’s head, but he told her he liked her, and that’s all it took to convince her to come inside. He offered her a soda laced with drugs that made her become dizzy, and then he raped her. The next day at school the boy and his friends informed her of the pictures they had taken of her, and threatened her to “earn the pictures back”, or they would share the pictures with everyone at school, her church, and to her family. From that day on, every night Theresa would receive a call around midnight and the boys would pick her up and bring her to random houses where often several men would be waiting for her. This continued for almost two years till her family relocated (Zukowski, 2015). This is one example of a girl being lured into sex trafficking as a teen and is one out of an estimated 800,000 women and children that are trafficked across international borders every year (Facts on human trafficking and sex slavery, 2012). Sex trafficking is a huge issue today and is only continuing to grow as an industry. In order to put an end to this horrifying issue more action must be taken in order for a difference of significance to be made. However, in order to take action people must understand the essence of what it is,
The Sage Dictionary of Criminology (2013) defines victimisation as “…a term originally used to designate an area of study concerned to address the relationship between the victim and offender.” It should be noted however that since the late 1970s, the term has
Next, to make a difference to end child prostitution is people should treat them as the victim, rather than treating them as the criminal. One clearly does not know what is going through their mind, so making judgements and statements does not help their situation at all. Julian Sher discusses that “When these children go get the attention of the system, they are almost always treated as criminals, not victims” (13). For what we can assume is that they did not choose this lifestyle but have just got caught up in it and have a hard time getting out. They are scared of their “pimp” who tells them if you do not do what I say I’ll kill you, hurt you, we’ll sell you to another pimp, etc. In the article, Report urges new approach to child prostitution: “ ‘These are children that are prostituted. These are children that are harmed. These are not criminals, Ellen Wright Clayton, a physician and member of the team, said at a press conference in Washington, D.C. on
Prostitution is a well-known act of offering sexual service to an individual in return for payment. In the documentary “Very Young Girls” it explains a candid perspective of prostitution and sex slavery in New York City. This film allows the viewers to see the works of a former prostitute Rachel Lloyd. Rachel Lloyd started an organization called GEM (Girls Education and Mentoring Services) to meet the needs of victimized young women who escape their handler and find an alternate route of life. It shows teenage girls during different stages of their transition. Although this program would hope for a successful turnout some girls are sp psychologically damaged by their owners that they feel obligated to return. Using the material from the previous class periods, it will further explain the theories of human behavior. The eight perspectives from chapter two and the trauma/ maltreatment effects on brain development.
GMO’s should not have any regulations because it helps keep our food safe and healthy. GMO has kept our food safe from pesticides. “ In the Us, adoption of GM crops resulted in pesticide reduction of 46.4 million pounds” (The Facts About GMO). As you see without GMO, our farmers would have been using pesticides to keep our food “healthy”, which we know is not healthy at all, because it’s chemicals in our food. But GMOs don’t use chemicals, it makes our food healthy without using chemicals. For example, papayas are genetically modified because papayas from Hawaii are infected by these insects, which because this disease . Though this disease is curable, GMO has helped it to be better. What I mean by better, is that they have taken an altered
Attention Getter: “Houston is a great city known internationally for energy, medical center, great food and Human sex trafficking. Picture this, there was this girl who fell involve with a military man and he persuaded her to move in with him to an undisclosed remote area. There she was raped and beat continually while being handcuffed to a door of an abandoned house. One day, she was approached by a middle-aged woman who had been watching her every move. They became the best of friends and did everything together, they were inseparable. Until one day she noticed a change in her friend and her friend that she thought she could trust turned out to be her female pimp. Also known as a bottom girl. The unthinkable happened: a client bargained with her for sex. After she refused his offer, he grabbed her by the hair, forced her on the floor and raped and beat her. In terror, she fled to the police to report the violence. Only to find that the she had no rights because she had attained the status of a “street-walker”. Eventually she was sent to Houston where her experience for human trafficking began” (NY State, 2011).
“Excluding white students from multicultural education generate in them an ethnocentricity that creates difficulties for them to interact in global society. They come to see their culture as the norm or the only ‘right’ way and find it difficult to interact with other cultures in a healthy or successful manner (Nieto, 2010, p. 74).”
Out of the thousands of people that have been human trafficking victims each year, only an insignificant amount of them is actually reported. Imagine being in 8th grade. Having all sorts of hopes and dreams. Now flash forward to dreams being taken away by a pimp that lures people into human trafficking. In short, this is true for Holly Austin Smith, a survivor of human trafficking. The punishment for the pimps that ruin the lives of these young girls is not severe. Therefore, there is not much help for the girls after they get rescued from this tragedy. A realization Holly had soon on and explains, “...Although I was soon recognized to be a victim, the specialized aftercare needed for a trafficking victim did not yet exist... Twenty years ago, there were no anti-trafficking laws in place. This pimp, who raped and lured a child into prostitution, served only 365 days in jail” (Smith). This young girl had recovered from this horrible incident all by herself. Many other girls in her position have gone through similar experiences and have been hurt by their pimp. In addition, the pimp will not receive much punishment. A sad story repeated across America and is very prominent in other countries. In America, most of the time victims are the ones that usually serve time in jail since in some cases it’s considered prostitution, even if it was forced by the pimp. In most cases, the pimps stay uncovered and if the victims of trafficking come forward as to who their pimp is, they
Sex trafficking, particularly that of children, has become a growing concern in the United States over the past several decades (Kotrla, 2010). By definition, child sex trafficking is “when a child (under 18 years of age) is induced to perform a commercial sex act” (U.S., 2013, para. 4), and includes forms such as prostitution and pornography (Kotrla, 2010). Researchers suggest that children are the most vulnerable to becoming victims of prostitution (Kotrla), and it is estimated that there are at least 100,000 victims in the United States (Estes & Weiner, 2001). Sex traffickers, otherwise known as “pimps,” often lure children with promises of food, clothing, love, and shelter, and then the pimps manipulate the children to keep them in prostitution (U.S. Department of Justice [DOJ], 2015). Awareness of the issue has led to the development of organizations, such as Children of the Night, that seek to help victims escape the sex trafficking industry (Children of the Night [COTN], 2016d).
Between 14,500 and 17,500 victims are trafficked into the United States annually, and often, the average age of entry is thirteen to fourteen years old (Hodge, 2008). One victim recalls that her pimp, a man who controls sex workers and keeps the earnings, would take her and two other girls from the ninth grade out of school during lunchtime, have them do calls, and bring them back. She explains, “He knew how to read each girl—this one likes to party, that one needs a job, this one wants drugs.” By doing
This essay also focuses on the issues of child – sex trafficking. The study claimed that trafficking women especially children for sexual slavery is one the fastest growing common criminal and a social issue in the world. The study states that in the united states, almost 6 in 10 identified trafficking survivors were trafficked for sexual abuse. Out of that figure, 98% of the victims are female and 70% of it are children. This because the number of victims of sex trafficking is children, this may go as young as the age of eight. This is because children are easy targets when
Theories of victimization essentially does something morally unpopular, by discussing how the victim caused their own victimization. Identified below are four theories of victimizations and examples of both strength and weakness of each. The goal for this paper is to briefly define at the four theories in order to grasp a better understanding of how individuals can lessen the opportunity to become a victim of a crime.
A woman, named Dellena, was involved in sex trafficking business. She made a documentary titled, “Human Trafficking Survivor Story: Dellena, California,” where she shares her experience as a victim. As a little girl, her mother was very negative and always put her down. Her parents were divorced when Dellena was just a child. Not before long her mother remarried. Dellena’s new stepfather molested her and her sister at the age of seven. Soon after her parents remarried, she was put in the foster care system for five years and her mother never once came to see her. One day her mother showed up and told Dellena she was going home. Dellena said, “The reason my mother wanted me home was because my stepfather wanted me home because he liked twelve-year-old girls. That was the perfect age for him” (“Human Trafficking Survivor Story: Dellena, California”). After being molested again, she ran away from her home. On the streets she met a 21-year old, who took her
Capital punishment has been in effect for centuries, and the topic of the death penalty invokes massive controversy still to this day. According to the Death Penalty Information Center (2015), Lake Research Partners took a poll in 2010, based on “support for alternatives to the death penalty.” The outcome of the survey resulted with a mere 33% of Americans in favor of capital punishment, in contrast to the 61% that were in support of an alternative to the death penalty. The remaining 6% voted they had no opinion either way. Is capital punishment the reasonable means of reprimand for the murder of another human being?