Human trafficking is a horrible tragedy in all of its forms, but it often doesn’t look like what we might expect. In fact, it’s not uncommon to encounter victims in everyday places – from schools to hospitals to nail salons. The challenge is knowing what to look for so that they can get help.

This week on Family Policy Matters, host Traci DeVette Griggs welcomes Heidi Olson, a forensic nurse and the Founder and President of Paradigm Shift Training and Consulting, to discuss her work teaching people how to help the victims of human trafficking who are right in front of them.

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Family Policy Matters
Helping the Victims in Front of Us (with Heidi Olson)

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: Thanks for joining us this week for Family Policy Matters. North Carolina has been described as a quote, “hot bed for human trafficking,” in part because of major interstate highways and the agriculture industry, which has traditionally provided jobs for seasonal migrants. Well, tragically, Hurricane Helene will make people even more vulnerable to human trafficking because of the housing and food insecurity it has created for so many living in western North Carolina. Statistically, 90% of trafficking victims come into contact with a health care worker while they’re being exploited, but less than 5% are identified. Well, today’s guest is trying to change that. Heidi Olson is a certified pediatric nurse and certified pediatric sexual assault nurse examiner. She’s founder and president of Paradigm Shift Training and Consulting that offers state of the art training to combat human trafficking and child exploitation in medical facilities. Heidi Olson, welcome to Family Policy Matters.

HEIDI OLSON: Thank you so much for having me. It’s an honor to be here.

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: All right, so tell us. How did this happen? How did you become a nurse who works on human trafficking cases?

HEIDI OLSON: Yeah, so it wasn’t something that I set out to do. I didn’t even realize the just enormity of the problem. I became a forensic nurse with the intent that I wanted to take care of kids who had been sexually assaulted, and really, within probably a month or two of doing that job, I realized we’re seeing kids who are being trafficked, but we’re not calling it by its correct name. So we’re labeling these kids as, oh, this is a runaway. This is a kid using drugs. This is a sexual assault victim. But beneath all of that was exploitation and trafficking, the kids just didn’t have that language. You know, they’re saying that’s what’s happening without saying it through their behaviors and kind of other disclosures. And so I think for me, I started to realize very quickly, this is a huge problem, and we’re not doing anything about it as healthcare workers, we’re not screening. We don’t have protocols or policies in place, you know, we don’t even understand how to truly identify this population. So that was about 10 years ago that this journey started, and just the amount of trafficking victims that are seeing healthcare workers is mind blowing.

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: So tell us a little bit about what you might tell these emergency room or hospital personnel as far as how to recognize human trafficking?

HEIDI OLSON: Yeah. So, I think for a lot of healthcare workers that I teach, the first thing they say is like, this isn’t happening here. We’re not seeing it. And the reality is, yes, you are. We’re calling it by a different name. So unfortunately, oftentimes this population is stigmatized and labeled as, oh, this person’s crazy. They’re a frequent flyer. They’re always here. They’re drug seeking. They are the one who always causes a ruckus in the ER, they are homeless. They’re a prostitute, whatever sort of stigma label we’re putting on them, we’re failing to see the exploitation that’s underneath and the trauma that’s causing the behaviors that we’re seeing. And so, I think really what I’m doing is shifting a healthcare workers mindset to say you are treating this population already. We’re calling it by this label or this diagnosis. Can we look beneath the surface at what’s really going on? Yes, the person who comes in and tests positive for fentanyl. Are there other things that are happening where they’re actually being exploited? What are the signs that you’re seeing in their body and their mental health history and their social history that point to trafficking, because victims are not going to come in and disclose. You’re never going to have a victim that sits down in an ER and is like, help me. I’m being trafficked. It doesn’t work like that, but there are lots of signs that we can look for.

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: Well, let’s talk a little bit about what happens. Somebody comes into a hospital and they’ve taken your training and they’re like, oh my goodness, this person meets all the signs that I was trained to look for. What happens there?

HEIDI OLSON: So that is something we equip healthcare workers with. We don’t want to only teach here’s the signs that you look for, have the awareness, but then you don’t know what to do. And so, if we’re talking about kids, of course we are mandated reporters. As healthcare workers, we have to follow mandating reporting protocols, and we have to safety plan. We’re recognizing this with a child, we have to make sure they go somewhere safe. With adults, there’s a little more autonomy. And so, what we do when we train is we connect hospitals with advocacy groups who work with trafficking victims, local nonprofits, other places that can help provide support outside of the hospital. So, we try to connect the hospital with that continuum of care of okay, we recognize this. We’re providing resources, and if a victim wants those resources, then kind of, where do we send them? How can we help support them as they get out of this life?

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: Okay. So basically, for an adult, you’re just letting them know that you understand what’s going on with them. Here’s some resources if they want help, and then pretty much the ball is in their court,

HEIDI OLSON: Yes, and it has to be, I think that sometimes we have this perception of we have to go in and rescue that person. Have to yank them out of this situation. And if a person is not making a choice of their own free will, they’re going to go right back to that situation because it’s known, because it’s familiar, and so they have to be the one saying, I’m actually choosing to do something else, even though it’s terrifying, I’m going to accept services. So, it can take 7 to 11 times of intervention before an adult victim chooses to leave a trafficking situation.

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: Wow. Great statistic there. Thank you for sharing that. Okay, so I’ve heard that most of us encounter people who are human trafficked without even knowing it, whether it’s in a restaurant or a cleaning crew or something along those lines. So, do you teach other industries as well? Or is it just medical?

HEIDI OLSON; I do. Yes. So, we tailor our trainings to anyone who wants to learn more about this and how to recognize it. So, to churches, community members, you know, social workers, teachers, anyone who’s interested. The reality is, all of us are intersecting with trafficking victims. It’s hidden in plain sight. It’s in front of us, just most of us have never been taught what to look for. You know, we think it’s like the movie Taken where people are being abducted and thrown into a van and hidden in a basement somewhere, when many survivors I’ve talked to are like I was going to school while I was being trafficked by my parents. I was in church. I was encountering all these different professionals and people. I passed by people in the community at Walmart or at a gas station. And so, I think when we can equip people with here’s what you look for, here are the red flags, you’re gonna have a gut feeling about it, and here’s what you do, it really starts to increase recognition.

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: It’s not always sexual, right? There’s other ways of trafficking humans.

HEIDI OLSON: Absolutely, there’s lots of other ways. And so, I think the ways that get overlooked, of course, we’ve got labor trafficking, and I think that is often overlooked, just like you were saying it’s happening in places like restaurants, in fields, in nail salons and in massage parlors. I mean, it’s all over the place. Labor trafficking is happening, and it can happen in conjunction with sex trafficking, right? Someone can be sold for sex at night and be forced to work, you know, at a gas station during the day, and they’re not getting compensated at all. I think another one that we miss a lot is forced criminality. So, a trafficker is trying to make as much money as he can. So not only am I selling this person for sex, but guess what? You’re going to sell drugs for me too, or you’re going to forge checks for me, or you’re going to shoplift for me. And so, a lot of victims get arrested for forced criminality, or their trafficker has forced them in to engage in some kind of crime, and very often, the criminal justice system is not recognizing those person is actually being trafficked. So, there’s lots of sectors who are intersecting with this population and missing them, unfortunately.

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: What about policy? Are we dropping the ball a little bit on public policy, or are there some ways that we can step things up so that we can protect more of these people, especially here in our state?

HEIDI OLSON: Unfortunately, what I have seen happen so kind of my role right as a healthcare worker, I’m boots on the ground. I’m seeing victims, kind of in this crisis moment. And I think a lot of times what happens with policy is it’s getting made at this level, way up here, with policy makers that are like, in theory, this is a good idea, and then it doesn’t actually trickle down to boots on the ground. This is how it’s implemented, if that makes sense. So, I think I’ve seen lots of different states where it’s like, that’s a great idea. It never gets practice, right? The different laws never get enacted. The funding doesn’t come through for, you know, victim services. And so, I think that’s sort of where the disconnect, at least, where I see lies that we can have great policy in place, but if it doesn’t actually translate down to the people who are providing services, what good does it do? And I’ve seen that many times where there’s policies in place or policies that sound good in theory, but none of the legislators have bothered to talk to trafficking survivors, right, to say, would this actually make sense in the context of this crime? So in their heads, it makes sense, but it’s like, you’ve never been trafficked. We have to talk to the population. It actually impacts. So, I think there are, there’s lots of great policy. There’s a lot of, I think, care and empathy that exists in this space, but it doesn’t always translate down to, how does this impact the population in those frontline spaces?

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: So, you also talk a lot about pornography and its connection to child-on-child sexual assault. Why do you feel like that goes along with the human trafficking training that you do?

HEIDI OLSON: It’s all connected so more than trafficking as a forensic nurse. So, you know, of course, I’m seeing lots of trafficking victims, lots of sexual assault victims. More than kind of that side of things, I am seeing so much child-on-child sexual assault, you know, meaning a kid who is sexually harming another child. And no one talked to me about this when I became a forensic nurse, and so this was just a trend that blew my mind. So, as I started collecting data and gathering information, I started to realize there are so many kids sexually assaulting other kids, in part because they’re being exposed to pornography and they’re acting out what they’re seeing. So, what the way this all is connected to trafficking is we’re seeing a ton of kids who are seeing porn at really, really young ages, violent porn. It’s extremely desensitizing. They go online and people are asking them for nude photos and videos. There’s no red flags going off for these, you know, 11-12, year olds who have been seeing porn for years at this point, it’s like, well, yeah, I mean, this is normal. Everyone does it. I’ve seen naked bodies for years at this point. No big deal. They send nude photos and videos, which is child sexual abuse material at that age, and then they’ve got, you know, they send a picture to a stranger, say on Snapchat, that stranger shares it with all kinds of people, and then suddenly we’ve got traffickers, predators, pedophiles, just inundating these kids online with, Hey, if you send me another naked video or photo, I’ll send you money to your cash app. I’ll buy you this all, whatever. So now we’ve got a sex act in exchange for something of monetary value that’s considered trafficking with kids. There doesn’t even have to be a trafficker present. So, we’re seeing that a ton with kids who are exchanging nude photos, videos, things like that, because they’ve seen so much pornography, and people are giving them things for it. So, it’s normalizing transactional sex. And these kids don’t think they’re being abused or exploited. They’re like, I’m awesome. Someone thinks I’m hot. And so, there’s been this societal grooming to normalize that, and it’s a really, really frightening trend.

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: Wow. That is frightening. For parents who might be hearing this and think, Gosh, I’d love to bring them to my church association, or I’d like to have this in at my work. How can they go about getting in touch with you?

HEIDI OLSON: So, you can find me at my website. It’s ParadigmShiftTC.com, as in training and consulting, and or you can find me on LinkedIn under Heidi Olson. Either way, send me a message, and I will meet with you, and we can talk through what you’re needing. I love doing trainings. We get great evaluations. It’s absolutely affordable. So really, what we say is we want everyone to have this information, so we’re willing to work with different groups, kind of within the confines of their budget. We don’t have a set right to say, like it’s going to be $5,000 every time, because we know a lot of groups can’t afford something like that. And this information, we don’t want to be gatekeepers. We want people to have it. So please reach out. We’ll work with you. We love training and equipping people

TRACI DEVETTE GRIGGS: All right. Heidi Olson with Paradigm Shift Training and Consulting. Thanks so much for your good work and for being with us today on Family Policy Matters.

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