TCI News
TCI: Human Trafficking – The Misery Involved
#TurksandCaicos, April 17, 2018 – Providenciales – The Commission, with increasing global awareness has expressed concern over the potential of trafficking of persons and especially for the trafficking of women from the Dominican Republic and most recently Venezuela. Women are routinely provided with visas or work permits and are being brought into the country the disguise of legitimate working opportunities such as bar maids, nannies, waitresses, and dancers only to find themselves, unwillingly in most cases, plying sexual favours, engaging in prostitution or being victims of other forms of forced labour.
It is an established fast that human traffickers prey on people who are poor, isolated and weak. Issues such as disempowerment, social exclusion and economic vulnerability are the result of policies and practices that marginalize entire groups of people and make them particularly vulnerable to being trafficked. Natural disasters, conflict and political turmoil weaken already tenuous social protection measures. Individuals are vulnerable to being trafficked not only because of conditions in their countries but also by the allure of opportunity, the relentless demand for inexpensive goods and services and the expectation of reliable income drive people into potentially dangerous situations where they are at risk of being exploited.
The annual trafficking report by the US State Department remarked that the “Turks and Caicos Islands are a destination country for men, women, and children subjected to sex trafficking and forced labour. According to local experts, the large population of migrants from Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Jamaica are vulnerable to sex trafficking and forced labour, with stateless children and adolescents especially at risk.” In an effort to combat trafficking the Turks and Caicos Islands Government has pushed the Trafficking in Persons Prevention Bill through the House of Assembly, the ordinance acquired assent on the 30th of January 2016 and came into force on the 12th of February 2016. This ordinance provides for sentences of up to 10 years for individuals involved in the traffic of persons and can act as a significant disincentive to those who are involved in this abhorrent trade.
Sex Trafficking
When women and girl children are coerced, forced, or deceived into prostitution, that person is considered a victim of trafficking. All persons involved in recruitment, transporting, harbouring, receiving or obtaining for that purpose are committing a crime under the Trafficking in Persons Prevention Ordinance 2016. Sexual trafficking can also occur with debt bondage as women and girls are forced into prostitution to pay of an illegal debt incurred through their transportation from one country to another. Upon to the host country they are told that this debt must be paid before they are freed and in most cases their identity documents are held by the traffickers.
Sexual trafficking is more than a crime or migration issue, it is a fundamental human rights issue, and, in many respects, it is a manifestation of persistent gender inequality and a symptom of the subordinate status of women globally. Around the world most trafficked people are women and children, data provided by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime suggested that globally 70% of trafficked people were female (49% women and 21% girls). Surprisingly the same report identified that many of the traffickers were themselves women and that in some parts of the world women trafficking women was held to be the norm.
Trafficking has a harrowing effect on the mental, emotional and physical wellbeing of the women and girls ensnared in its web. Beyond the physical abuse, trafficked women suffer extreme emotional stress, including shame, grief, fear, distrust and suicidal thoughts. Victims often experience post-traumatic stress disorder, and with that, acute anxiety, depression and insomnia. Many victims turn to drugs and alcohol to numb the pain.
Sex trafficking also promotes societal breakdown by removing women and girls from their families and communities. Trafficking fuels organized crime groups that usually participate in many other illegal activities, including drug and weapons trafficking and money laundering. It negatively impacts local and national labour markets, due to the loss of human resources and burdens public health systems. It erodes government authority, encourages widespread corruption, and threatens the security of vulnerable populations.
Victims of trafficking for forced labour lose their freedom, becoming modern-day slaves. They usually experience permanent physical and psychological harm, isolation from families and communities, reduced opportunities for personal development, and restricted movement. Victims are often wary of law enforcement and psychologically dependent on their traffickers. Child victims are denied educational access, which reinforces the cycle of poverty and illiteracy.
Human trafficking is modern day slavery and it is alive and well in the Turks and Caicos Islands. Recently a multi-agency task force has conducted raids across Providenciales and the allegations of many women who have been kept isolated and sexually exploited throughout the island have been rescued. It is to be hoped that the authorities, Police and Immigration, will be carrying out intensive investigations into those responsible for these alleged offences
and that they will eventually be brought to justice.
Everyone has the potential to identify a trafficked person. While victims may sometimes be kept behind locked doors in homes or brothels, they are often hidden right in front of us at, for example, construction sites, restaurants, elder care centres, nail salons, agricultural fields, and hotels. Traffickers’ use of coercion – such as threats of deportation and harm to the victim or their family members – is so powerful that even if you reach out to victims, they may be too fearful to accept your help. Knowing indicators of human trafficking will help you act on your gut feeling that something is wrong and report it to the RTCIPF Sexual Offences Unit or the Offices of the Human Rights Commission.
Human Trafficking Indicators
While not an exhaustive list, these are some key red flags that could alert you to a potential trafficking situation that should be reported:
It is the responsibility of every one of us to assist the authorities in stamping out this sinister crime.
Release: Human Rights Commission
Wilkie Arthur
Freelance Court Correspondent
#TurksandCaicos, April 25, 2024 – He was busted at the Howard Hamilton Providenciales International Airport on Friday, April 16, 2024.
He allegedly had in his luggage four (4) rounds of 6.5mm ammunition on his departure to his homeland in Oklahoma in the United States of America (USA).
Ryan Watson and his wife were arrested and placed into police lock up. Both were later granted police bail, and upon return to police station the Monday after the couple’s arrest, the husband alone was charged by detective Police Constable Kimberlee Markland for
unlawful possession of the four rounds of ammunition.
Watson was escorted to court on Tuesday, April 23rd, placed before the learned Chief Magistrate Mr. Jolyon Hatmin and remanded to His Majesty’s Prison until his sufficiency hearing on June 7, this (2024) year.
His counsel, Mr. Oliver Smith KC and his junior assistant Mrs. Kimone Tennant immediately sought bail for him in the Supreme Court which was heard the following day (Wednesday April 24) before her Ladyship Ms. Tanya Lobban-Jackson and was granted bail, without hassle in the amount or $15,000.00 cash or surety.
The Crown, in the person of senior public prosecutor Ms. Tassja Mitchell did not oppose bail.
Magnetic Media can report that once again on the afternoon of the Tuesday April 24th, after the accused RYAN TYLER WATSON, 41 was remanded by the Magistrate’s court, the U.S. Embassy issued an warning to it’s citizens and travelers to carefully check their bags when traveling to Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI) as TCI authorities are strictly enforcing firearm and ammunition laws and if found you could go to prison for 12 years.
A real question of great concern and public importance is: should the TCI courts sentence tourists to the full mandatory minimum of 12 years imprisonment for simple possession firearm and/or ammunition.
The succinct answer is: Yes!
The Court of Appeal, just last month said in its written judgment that “ALL PERSONS,” including tourist/visitors must go to prison if found guilty or pleas guilty to firearm and ammunition offences.
However, there remains the concern about how much time in prison a judge should give a visitor regardless of the existence of exceptional circumstances.
Should the judge imprison a visitor to the territory, who may have been wrongly informed, for example, the full mandatory minimum term or must a reduced prison term be imposed.
If TCI judges start to give less than the mandatory minimum to tourists/visitors, it is being strong and widely advocated by senior defense attorneys that the same must apply to local or residents of these Islands, who may also present exceptional circumstances.
Arguments about the equity in delivery of justice is what drove the question to the Court of Appeal late in 2023. The decision came this past February.
‘We cannot find ourselves sentencing tourists regardless of exceptional circumstances to lesser sentences, and when those same exceptional circumstances are found in local cases, it’s being ignored by our judges.’
Human Rights Attorney, Sheena Mair has on more than one occasion argued this point; including in firearm and ammunition bail applications. She would put the very same judges and prosecutors from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecution on the spot by reminding the judges and the prosecutors that precedent has been set.
‘You’ve just granted bail to a tourist for firearm and ammunition but now here’s a local person, same charge but because he’s a local he can’t get bail? He has to be remanded pending a trial that could take years before it’s heard?’
Mair has valiantly outlined the wrong in this and clearly stated this practice is “not fair” and it’s “not proper administration of justice in the Turks and Caicos Islands.”
Ms. Mair further complained that tourists would plea guilty to possession of firearm and ammunition and be released on bail pending sentencing but as for a local, he or she has to wait on remand at the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation pending sentencing.
The attorney criticizes the optics of such decisions and is on record reminding the Judge that the Court of Appeal has already set out that the law applies to everyone; visitors and locals alike.
A police statement issued Wednesday April 24 informs: “Today (April 24th), Mr. Watson appeared in the Supreme Court and, following a bail application, was granted $15,000 bail with the following conditions:
1) Not travel out of TCI without the court’s permission.
2) Surrender his passport and all other travel documents to the court
3) Report to Grace Bay Police Station on Tuesdays and Thursdays between the hours of 8 am-4 pm,
4) Reside at the given address in Providenciales; any address change will be provided before the court.”
The American from Oklahoma whose story is trending in the US and has been carried by leading news networks was joined by a host of loved ones at the Courthouse.
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