Show notes
Dr. Sandie Morgan and Dave Stachowiak talk about restoration with Beth Grant, co-founder & executive director of Project Rescue. Together they discuss the challenges with aftercare for victims of human trafficking and how to best support healing in this community through genuine collaboration.
Key Points
- The physical rescue of a victim is typically the easiest part of the restoration, the long journey of holistic care is more difficult.
- If our priority is the restoration of these victims, a collaboration of people with different professional skills, initiatives, organizations, and faiths is not only possible but necessary.
- We cannot allow this space to feel competitive, but rather collaborative and allow for us to celebrate what other organizations are doing well.
Resources
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Transcript
Dave [00:00:00] You’re listening to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast. This is episode number 215 – Dr. Beth Grant and the Long Path to Restoration.
Production Credits [00:00:09] Produced by Innovate Learning, Maximizing Human Potential.
Dave [00:00:30] Welcome to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast. My name is Dave Stachowiak.
Sandie [00:00:35] And my name is Sandie Morgan.
Dave [00:00:38] And this is the show where we empower you to study the issues, be a voice, and make a difference in Ending Human Trafficking. Sandie, today we have with us a long friend and supporter of the Global Center for Women and Justice. And I’m so excited for our conversation today.
Sandie [00:00:54] Well, I’m excited to introduce my very good friend, and colleague, mentor. I learned a lot from Dr. Beth Grant in the early days of my work in anti-trafficking, but she’s been a part of my life for a very long time, and I appreciate her willingness to be on our podcast. So, this is Dr. Beth Grant, co-founder and executive director of Project Rescue. Welcome to the show, Beth.
Beth [00:01:23] Thanks so much, and it’s a pleasure.
Sandie [00:01:26] Well, I remember in the early days having conversations about a lot of the challenges with aftercare for victims of human trafficking, and you’ve been a leader for decades in this. When was Project Rescue founded?
Beth [00:01:43] In 1997.
Sandie [00:01:45] That’s before we even had the Trafficking Victims Protection Act. And I loved the story of how it was so driven from the field. And I just want our listeners to know how we can be in the moment and do something when we get started, but maybe then later we’re going to have to add some structure. But will you tell the story of how KK Devaraj called David?
Beth [00:02:14] Yes, KK Devaraj had been our colleague in southern Asia, for a number of years. And working with teens on the street in his major city, huge city. And one evening, he felt with his team to go into a very infamous, huge red-light district in his city, where he had never been before. He took his team there and was stunned and in tears by what he witnessed. Many times, we assume women and children in prostitution are there by choice. And in this case, they are exposed to an area of a city of up to 100,000 people where women and children had been sold into prostitution. That was in 1997, that night when he met some of these women. He just threw out an invitation. I’m up for trying to help in any way they could. What they said to him was, “we cannot leave this place, we’re slaves, but could you take our daughter to a place of safety because they’re growing up under our cots as we service customers, and could you take our daughters to a place of safety?” That night, they asked him to take 37 little girls, ages three to twelve. In that moment, he called my husband. He said, “this is what has just happened. We’ve worked together before, could we take 37 little girls and start a home?” And immediately, when we heard Sandie about that need and realized how those little girls got there in their future unless someone intervened, immediately we said yes. And my husband said, “absolutely, Devaraj, absolutely.” So, it’s how to plan without a strategy, without really much knowledge about this. We said yes at the moment because we knew these little girls were in God’s heart, every single one of them. So, that was the start that night when we said “yes” that was the beginning of Project Rescue. That was 22, 23 years ago and those thirty-seven little girls were taken to a safe place and that became the first aftercare home before there even was a trafficking world that we were aware of, but it was a response to that need at the moment.
Sandie [00:04:46] So you’ve learned a lot of lessons along the way.
Beth [00:04:50] Oh my goodness, what a journey!
Sandie [00:04:52] Ha! So, you already have a Ph.D., but I feel like you’ve earned two or three more in the process of leading project rescue and growing it. How many countries are you in now?
Beth [00:05:05] Ten.
Sandie [00:05:05] Ten countries?
Beth [00:05:07] Yes, in southern Asia and Europe and upcoming in Africa.
Sandie [00:05:12] Oh, I can’t wait too. I expect to be invited to visit your African sites when you get started, just so you know.
Beth [00:05:19] You have an open invitation.
Sandie [00:05:21] Alright. So, what I think I’d really like to talk about with restoration is that rescue is only the beginning. So, how long did you keep those kids, a year, maybe, or six months?
Beth [00:05:38] Well, some of them were with us probably at least a year to 2 years, because once you took little girls who were three, four, five, six, seven years of age in that culture and you take them out of their only community, their mothers, then you have a commitment to help them find mental, physical, medical, emotional healing, very holistic. We quickly learned that we had to provide holistic care, that the actual physical rescue ending up actually being the easy part of this journey. And so, some of those girls really graduated from the program when they were 18 years old. So, some of them were with us, yes- ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen years. Until they came to a place where they had sufficient education and vocational training, where they had a future back in society to walk in to. And so many of those young girls now over these years have graduated. And where they had the ability to do graduate studies and have MBAs. They’re professional women in their community and cities. So, while it was a daunting jou...
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