Sandie Morgan and Dave Stachowiak interview Esther Brown, the Sexually Exploited Youth Project Administrator in Las Vegas, to learn what she is doing to serve commercially sexually exploited youth in Las Vegas, Nevada. Esther provides insight on what it mean to provide victim advocacy to youth who have been exploited and the current gaps in services.

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Transcript

Dave [00:00:00] You’re listening to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast. This is episode number 21, recorded in January 2012. Welcome to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast. My name is Dave Stachowiak.

Sandie [00:00:27] And my name is Sandie Morgan.

Dave [00:00:30] 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, glad to be back with you for episode number 21. And I’m glad that we have a guest with us again today to teach us more about how we can utilize our resources and knowledge to end human trafficking. And I’m so grateful for all these wonderful resources and relationships you have all over the world. And so I know our guest today is going to be phenomenal in helping us to gain more traction on this issue.

Sandie [00:01:04] Well, I’m really excited to have our guest today. I met her first when I was invited over to Las Vegas to meet with a team that work with commercially sexually exploited children. And then she and part of her team came to Vanguard when we had the Juvenile Justice Summit. And I learned so much from her because of her direct experience with working with many, many of these victims and trying to figure out the best way to address that. She’s going to be part of our March Ensure Justice conference.

Dave [00:01:41] Oh, great.

Sandie [00:01:41] Coming up March 2nd and 3rd.

Dave [00:01:43] Good.

Sandie [00:01:43] It’s time to get your registration. And Dave, if you haven’t at GCWJ.vanguard.edu.

Dave [00:01:50] I’m actually going to be doing mine in the next few days here. Because I have it on my list to get it in and to get on the registration list.

Sandie [00:01:57] Because you want the early bird special.

Dave [00:01:59] That’s exactly what I have on my task list is to get in before the early bird special finishes.

Sandie [00:02:05] So, before I introduce our guest, I do want to tell you that if you have a question and you want to call it in, you can call the direct line 714-966-6360 and leave a voicemail and we’ll use that question in our next podcasts. Also, you can email directly to [email protected].

Dave [00:02:29] And I don’t know if we’ve mentioned this recently, Sandie, but we do of course have a Facebook page set up as well, which has not only the podcast episodes on it, but in addition to that, a lot of conversation and articles and dialogue that is valuable for anyone who cares deeply about ending this issue. And so go ahead and if you’re on Facebook and you haven’t already tapped into that, do a search on Facebook for the Global Center for Women and Justice. That’s again here at Vanguard University. And you’ll be able to find us there, connect with us, and really join the dialogue that will help all of us to stay connected in being able to address the issues, but also to be able to study the issues so we can really make a difference.

Sandie [00:03:09] Exactly. So I’m excited to introduce to you Esther Brown. When she introduces herself she often remarks about her accent from Mississippi. I have to tell you a secret. It’s not Mississippi. It’s Barcelona, Spain. And like, do we have the music?

Dave [00:03:28] I don’t have any.

Sandie [00:03:30] No, okay. But she doesn’t live in Barcelona anymore. She is the sexually exploited youth project administrator in Las Vegas, Nevada. So, Esther, welcome.

Esther [00:03:43] Thank you. How are you guys? Thank you for having me here today.

Sandie [00:03:47] Well, I’m excited. I want you to explain to our listeners what your job title means. Sexually exploited youth project administrator. What do you do?

Esther [00:04:01] Well, we will need the 30 minutes only to explain you what I do. But the long title that I have, it’s created just to give an overview of the part of the job that we’re doing for this project. Goal number one is trying to identify who are the victims of sexual exploitation in Las Vegas and also the ones who come from other jurisdictions. How many of these girls or boys, because we have some boys too, a few, are too old system. So they are part of a child welfare or the dependency system. And you think California it is delinquency at the same time and what type of the resources we have in our community in another state so we can bring the resources together to serve and cover the needs of these victims.

Sandie