A Chicago civil rights attorney spoke to a room full of Bradley students about her client’s fight to combat child sex trafficking in the United States.
Bhavani Raveendran gave her lecture, “Combating Human Trafficking Through the Courts” to a packed GCC 126 Tuesday, April 30th.
The lecture was sponsored by numerous Bradley organizations and clubs, including Center for Legal Studies and Department of Sociology.
Raveendran is a civil rights attorney based in Chicago. Her lecture focused on her ongoing case, Ambrose v. Backpage.com.
She began by describing her type of work.
“This is kind of a newer area of law,” Raveendran said. She said it’s new because human trafficking is hard to prove, and most survivors of human trafficking are traumatized and wouldn’t want to file a lawsuit.
But as Raveendran describes, lawsuits aren’t the only way to fight human trafficking. Before these cases came along, people were trying to end human trafficking in other ways, like through advocacy or legislative action.
The lecture centered on Raveendran’s experience with the Ambrose v. Backpage.com case.
She introduced the case by showing a trailer for the documentary I am Jane Doe. The victims who told their stories had similar experiences of being sold into human trafficking via the domain backpage.com.
As one individual in the trailer says, “Backpage is the walmart of human trafficking.”
Raveendran fighting on behalf of her client, Desiree Robinson, who was killed at the age of 16 after being sold by on Backpage.com. Raveendran said Robinson’s mother, Yvonne Ambrose, is so compelling to listen to because she wants sex trafficking to end for others. She testified to the U.S. Senate about her daughter’s case to help promote the signing of the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act.
Alex Fossburgh is a freshman political science major. She attended the lecture because she has been following the Backpage case.
“It was powerful because you could tell [Ambrose] was so passionate about making sure another child would never be trafficked so easily,” Fossburgh said.
Other students who attended the lecture also appreciated Raveendran’s compelling story of advocacy.
“I thought it was really helpful seeing how you can turn advocacy into a career path” Jacob Sanders, a junior organizational communications major said.
“I’ve also seen the documentary a couple times,” Fossburgh said, “So it was good to know that Backpage and its founders will be held responsible for profiting off of child sex slavery.”
After her lecture, Raveendran paused for questions.
A student raised her hand, asking, “What can we do? How can we help survivors of sex trafficking?”
Raveendran smiled. “There’s so much you can do as an individual,” she said. She began a list of options: volunteering for advocacy groups, lobbying for laws you believe in, reaching out to organizations, and donating clothing or other materials to shelters and safe houses for victims.
Her hopeful tone brought a sense of lightness to the room, lifting the weight of uncomfortable stillness the room had after discussing such a dark matter as child sex trafficking. In fact, throughout the lecture, Raveendran would make a quick joke or a sly remark to brighten the otherwise dark tone of the room.
Raveendran recognized the heavy nature of her work, and therefore understood its importance that much more.
Sanders says, “I think she’s doing work that other people are too intimidated to do.”
“These are hard cases,” Raveendran said, “but they are very much worth the work.”