There were more than 200 people identified as potential human trafficking victims in Ohio last year – nearly all of them female, and more than a quarter of them under 18. Those are the latest stats from a report presented to the state's task force on human trafficking.
The number of potential victims is up slightly over last year’s report. But officials say there’s a detail that explains that.
“It absolutely is the case that increased awareness yields more people being helped, ” said Ohio's human trafficking coordinator Elizabeth Ranade-Janis.
Ranade-Janis said it’s estimated more than a thousand kids are being trafficked in Ohio at any time. There were more than 100 investigations in the last year – a third resulted in criminal convictions. Most of these were suspected sex trafficking cases, but six victims were thought to be involved in labor trafficking.
