Attorneys Settled Case for Trafficked Child Against Child Welfare Agencies and Motel for Undisclosed Sum
Justice for Kids® attorneys Stacie Schmerling, Howard Talenfeld and Justin Grosz represented a former foster child in a federal lawsuit filed in the Southern District of Florida against community-based child welfare agencies and an emergency shelter for failure to protect the then 17-year-old foster child from being sold into sex trafficking in 2012 and held captive in a Fort Lauderdale hotel.
The teen girl was sold to a human trafficking ring in 2012 by a staff member of the shelter, which, along with two other nonprofits, failed to offer her the help she clearly needed, the suit claimed. Her captors drugged her and prostituted her, advertising on Backpage while showing a picture of her in the motel room. She was located through that picture identifying the hotel.
The suit claimed the defendants continued to allow the teen to stay at the emergency shelter in The Florida Keys despite her running away eight times in two months. The shelter was a “dangerous” place “that could not protect [her] from harm,” attorneys wrote. “[the shelter] blatantly ignored and/or deliberately failed to learn of the plethora of red flags, dangers and warning signs that [the teen’s] needs were not being properly assessed and provided for,” as stated the lawsuit. During 41 days of captivity, the teen was forced into prostitution and sex with her captors, who threatened to murder her and her family if she tried to escape or refused their orders, forced to take drugs and contracted a sexually transmitted disease.
The lawsuit named no shelter staff members but arrived months after the former shelter mentor was sentenced to 32 years in prison for child sex trafficking of two girls who were 15 and 16. The case settled for an undisclosed amount against the child welfare agencies responsible for failing to provide her an appropriate placement and for placing her into the custody of the traffickers. The claim was also settled for an undisclosed amount as to the motel that turned a blind eye and knew she was being victimized in the hotel.
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