Feds Bust Alleged Ukrainian Smuggling Ring
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Now, an investigation about human trafficking: Federal agents say they've broken up a smuggling ring responsible for bringing hundreds of Ukrainian immigrants into the United States. Ring members allegedly helped Ukrainians first get into Mexico, and then they took them into San Diego and on to other cities. CNN's Charles Feldman has more.</s>CHARLES FELDMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It was early morning in L.A. when the arrests came down: 11 people busted from running what the FBI calls "a well-organized Eurasian crime ring" that smuggled Ukrainian nationals into the U.S. -- some paying up to $7,000. Among those arrested: the reputed ringleader of the international operation. The FBI says, "when many of the Ukrainians were unable to pay the smuggling fees, they were forced to work in prostitution."</s>PATRICK PATTERSON, FBI: Well, we know that a little over 200 were interdicted by the border patrol and INS. And our conservative estimate is that was probably about 10 percent of the total operation.</s>FELDMAN: The FBI says Ukrainians who wanted to come to the U.S. were recruited in Kiev, Ukraine and then, with Mexican tourist visas in hand, flown to Mexico. From there, by foot, car and boat, they were brought initially into southern California. This government video purports to show the Coast Guard coming upon one of the boats used to smuggle some of the Ukrainian immigrants. The investigation is ongoing, with more arrests possible both in the United States and overseas. Charles Feldman, CNN, Los Angeles.</s>COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN ANCHOR: We give you more on this issue now with Laura Lederer. She is director of the Protection Project. That's a legal research institute that's doing a study on the trafficking of women and children. She joins us from Washington. Laura, thanks for being here.</s>LAURA LEDERER, DIRECTOR, PROTECTION PROJECT: Thank you.</s>MCEDWARDS: Let's begin right where this story begins: in the Ukraine. Why do people want to get out? Is it the economic situation?</s>LEDERER: Well, as in other trafficking cases, yes; if there's economic or political instability or terrible poverty, people are trying to escape those conditions.</s>MCEDWARDS: OK, and describe their journey, then; what happens?</s>LEDERER: Well, in -- I think in the case of many of the women from Eastern Europe and the newly independent states and Russia, there are very sophisticated methods of recruiting them. They may answer job applications that are asking them whether they want to have a job in tourism or in banking or whether they'd like -- just like to travel abroad. Or they may be recruited on the street and told that they're, you know, very good-looking and they could be part-time models. There are many, many different ways of recruiting these young women.</s>MCEDWARDS: So do some of them think that they're coming to the United States somehow legitimately and that their paperwork is going to be done, or do they know that this is illegal?</s>LEDERER: Well -- and this is the difference between a classic case of alien smuggling and trafficking -- in a classic case of alien smuggling, a deal is made, really, between the smuggler and the smugglee. You pay me such and such an amount of money, and I will take you across the border and then our agreement ends -- so you go your way and I go mine. In a trafficking case, it begins with a deception, coercion, some kind of threats or intimidation, luring, inducement, where the young woman or the child is promised something that is never going to be the case. Then when they get to the new country, their passport and Visa are taken away and they're forced into situations of prostitution, sexual servitude, slavery-like conditions.</s>MCEDWARDS: And -- now why did they come through Mexico?</s>LEDERER: I think as the -- what we call "receiver countries" or "countries of destination" are tightening their borders, watching for trafficking cases, the traffickers are looking for those loopholes -- countries where the laws are lax, or where they're non-existent, or where there is not law enforcement -- and where it's easier to get a load of people, really, hundreds, sometimes thousands into a country and then move them from there to another country.</s>MCEDWARDS: Now, one of the most astonishing things about this case that we just heard about is that the FBI got onto it by sort of stumbling on a videotape that was accidentally dropped by a Ukrainian family along a pathway that was used by the smugglers, and that's how they got onto this. Although I assume, in most cases, it isn't such happenstance. I mean, what's being done to get at this problem?</s>LEDERER: Well, I think actually this is probably classic, is that in the past 10 years it has been a more -- I don't want to say -- use the word "passive," but waiting for the cases to come to us. And what needs to happen now, if we want to stop the trafficking of women and children, which really is a contemporary form of slavery, there are going to have to be proactive federal investigative teams that can move out and look for clues and follow up on leads and actually find these cases, not wait for them to come to us.</s>MCEDWARDS: All right, a call for action -- and Laura Lederer, thanks so much for your thoughts this morning. I appreciate it.</s>LEDERER: Thank you for having me.