When I was a new truck driver, while parked at a truck rest stop, I was awoken from my sleep in the middle of the night by the sound of someone pounding on his door. Standing outside my door was a young girl – as young as maybe 15 or 16 years old – and she asked me if ‘I wanted some company.’ I told her to ‘go away,’ and she just stared at me momentarily and then turned and walked away. When I had looked into her eyes, they were lifeless. Because of ignorance and a lack of awareness about human trafficking, I never gave that young girl a chance to be rescued. It’s been 13 years since that day and I don’t know if she’s still on this earth, because once they are immersed in this culture, the average lifespan of these girls is ten years. I wish I could turn back the hands of time, but what I can do now is educate others. That is why I serve as an Ambassador for TAT.

I try to talk to everyone I can. The more people that understand human trafficking and realize that it is real and understand that it could be one of your children or grandchildren snatched off the street and sold into slavery, increases the number of people who can help. If I educate one person and they tell another, and those individuals talk to others, and so on, it multiplies and there are more eyes and ears out there helping us.

There are 3.36 million professional truck drivers on America’s roads. That’s a lot of eyes and ears that can catch something that law enforcement can’t. We train drivers to look out for the warning signs of human trafficking so they can be aware and not ignore it. We also work to educate busing companies, transit authorities, and shoremen that work the coast.