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Two months ago a 35-year-old football coach was indicted for pimping a 14-year-old girl at a Bowie, Md., high school, just 20 minutes from the high school where Munoz, a non-degree-seeking GW student, graduated.
On Saturday, the International Day to Abolish Slavery, Munoz, 22, decided to take a stance against human trafficking. She attended a rally to protest, publicized by two GW students who hope to bring the group Students Taking Action Against Trafficking, or STAAT, to campus.
"There's a lot of areas (around the world) where there is really high risk," Munoz said about trafficking, the commercial trade, or smuggling, of human beings into slavery markets for sex and unfree labor.
According to the United States Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000, human trafficking is defined as when a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud or coercion, or when the act is forced on someone under 18.
Saturday's human trafficking awareness rally was held in Dupont Circle's Provisions Library, where attendees watched an MTV documentary about human trafficking and listened to speakers from local awareness groups.
STAAT co-founder and GW senior Caitlin O'Leary said she hopes that movies about human trafficking will inspire GW's student body to take action against this growing international problem. O'Leary said the Lifetime channel mini-series "Human Trafficking" inspired her to take up cause.
"It blows you away," said O'Leary about the film that sparked her interest in human trafficking when it premiered in October 2005.
