IN JAMAICA: Duped & Discarded! Teens Tricked Into Running Away From Home Return Silent With Signs Of Sexual Abuse......With close to 300 children reported missing to the police in the first two months of this year. Human trafficking ?

Published: Sunday | March 23, 2014

With close to 300 children reported missing to the police in the first two months of this year, there are growing fears that some of these teenagers are victims of human trafficking and have been forced into the illicit sex trade.

Founder of advocacy group, Hear the
 Children's Cry, Betty Ann Blaine.

"We are not ruling out human trafficking and we wouldn't put a figure on it as we have no proof, but there are children who have gone missing with no trace," director of the police Missing Persons Unit, Inspector Terrence McLean, told The Sunday Gleaner.

He was responding to growing concerns that several teenagers, mainly girls, who have been reported missing in recent times are victims of a robust and illicit sex trade that lure them with gifts and affection.

These perverts use and abuse the girls and then spit them out, leaving many fearful, pregnant and silenced by threats.

Official figures show 134 children were reported missing in January and 158 in February. Of that number, 86 returned home after a couple of weeks in January and 105 in February.

Neither social workers nor the police have managed to convince most of these children to share their accounts of what happened during the period they were away from home.

Scars of carnal abuse

But the children return with visible scars of carnal abuse, including sexually transmitted infections and pregnancy. In a recent case in the Corporate Area, a 15-year-old who went missing for two weeks, returned home pregnant. more