12 | JANUARY 26 • 2023
In 2016, NCJW
, in partnership with
Bloomfield Hills and West Bloomfield
School districts, held a
symposium for hundreds of
teens and their caregivers
to teach how traffickers
ensnare their victims and to
offer community resources
to prevent the crime. Now,
Weintraub and Sitron
are looking to re-energize their efforts
with upcoming action and educational
programming in the spring. Those looking
for more information or who may want to
get involved can contact NCJW at https://
ncjwmi.org/volunteer.
A retired high school teacher with 17
years in the Detroit Public Schools and
Walled Lake school districts, Sitron’s
mission is to teach today’s teachers how to
spot red flags that might indicate a human
trafficking situation among their students.
“While school psychologists and social
workers have been trained in this area,
it is necessary for teachers to attain this
background as well,
” Sitron said. “Looking
back at the years I was teaching, I knew
of kids who had issues, but I didn’t know
anything about trafficking at the time. it
would be beneficial to go to various schools
and educate the staff as well as the teachers
so they can recognize the symptoms.
”
According to Weintraub, she and Sitron
initially decided to enroll in the training
back in 2014 because, at that time, Lansing
was starting to report increased numbers
of trafficking victims in Michigan. Though
numbers are still rising, Weintraub said
her committee aims to take away the
sensationalism, myths and conspiracy
theories surrounding the practice and
replace them with hard facts and data.
“For example, it is very rare for a person
to be kidnapped into a situation where they
are forced into sex work or manual labor
like you see in the movies,
” Weintraub
said. “Often, it can be a vulnerable person
who is promised work, fair wages and
even housing by the trafficker, and then
the person is told they must work off an
unforeseen debt.
”
IMMIGRATION POLICY
Ruby Robinson, managing attorney for
Michigan Immigrant Rights Center,
said this country’s longstanding lags
in improving its immigration policies
only exacerbate the numbers of those
trafficked for either sex or
labor. Just recently, he said his
organization aided a client
who was trafficked for three
years in a Detroit African hair-
braiding business.
Robinson explained
that from an immigration
standpoint, trafficking fits into two
categories: when someone is coerced or
forced into the commercial sex trafficking
trade or when they are forced or recruited
into an employment situation where they
are fraudulently told they are indebted
to the trafficker, resulting in involuntary
servitude. Robinson said it is not
uncommon to find people in domestic
situations, such as housecleaners or nannies
in the suburbs of West Bloomfield or
Bloomfield Hills.
“Such situations can also be found in
domestic or janitorial services, construction
or even agriculture,
” Robinson said.
OUR COMMUNITY
Rita Sitron
Ruby
Robinson
continued from page 11
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continued on page 14
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4320 Orchard Lake Rd
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