Page 35 - ATR 1 2016 web

Fighting Modern-day slavery

from the road

Truckers Against Trafficking enlists the trucking industry
in the effort to end human trafficking

by Jennifer barnett reed

Contributing Writer

Kevin Kimmel could have just
minded his own business that cold
January morning. He could have looked
the other way, told himself the men
knocking on the door of the RV parked
two slots down from him behind the
truck stop was none of his business. He
could have explained away the scared
face of the girl who peeked briefly out
from behind the RV’s closed curtains
before someone jerked them closed
again. He could have just closed his
own truck cab’s curtains and gotten
some sleep after a long night of driving
and deliveries.
Instead, he listened to his gut
and made a phone call. A few minutes
later, he watched as police knocked on
the door of the RV parked two slots
down from him at the rural Virginia
truck stop where he’d stopped to rest.
He watched as the scared, emaciated
young woman came out and talked to “it takes advaNtage of truck drivers’
the officers. Watched as they called an
ambulance to take her away and as they expertise, where they speNd their time, where
handcuffed the other two people in the they do their work, iN order to leverage
RV, a man and woman. that aNd Be good citizeNs.”
Kimmel, then a driver for Con-way
Freight, learned later that the young
woman was a victim of human traf- —shaNNoN NewtoN, ata’s presideNt
ficking. The couple police arrested had
kidnapped her in another state, and saved her life. Because of his decision to Trafficking, a nationwide organization
for two weeks they had tortured her, get involved, the young woman is now that works to leverage the eyes and ears
starved her, raped her and sold her for back home with her family, and her kid- of truck drivers and other industry
sex as they traveled from truck stop to nappers are in federal prison. employees in the fight against human
truck stop. Back in January 2015, Kimmel
Kimmel’s phone call most likely had never heard of Truckers Against 

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