Boy Saved From Traffickers on Flight to Florida

This is truly a lesson about being aware of our surroundings. I read this article on Reuters today and I plan to pay more attention everywhere I travel. I give a big shout to Deborah Sigmund. She saved this boy's innocence and quite possibly his life. Deborah, thank you for paying attention, speaking up and for all of the work you do with Innocents at Risk. You're one of my new abolitionist heroes.

(Left: Her Majesty Queen Silvia of Sweden.
Right: Deborah Sigmund, founder of Innocents at Risk)

Airlines' role grows in war on U.S. sex trafficking

Thu Oct 7, 2010 12:51pm EDT

By Mickey Goodman

ATLANTA, Oct 7 (Reuters Life!) - Airline passenger Deborah Sigmund noticed something strange about the man and boy who ran up late to catch a US Airways flight last December from Washington to Palm Beach, Florida.

When staff at the gate asked the man for the boy's name, he had to rifle through papers for an answer. On board, Sigmund quietly asked the boy why he was going to Florida.

"I thought I was going to North Carolina," he said.

Sigmund said she alerted the aircrew who radioed ahead to authorities about a possible case of child trafficking. Her quick wits helped her spot what authorities later told her was a likely case of a child abducted for use in pornography.

Her intervention is evidence of a growing effort by grass-roots organizations in the hotel and airline industries to back up the work of governments and international law enforcement in fighting human trafficking.

But Sigmund had a head start. As founder of non-profit Innocents at Risk, she ... (Read Full Story)

SOURCE: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0627221420101007?pageNumber=1