Remember the impactful moments that change your life course? For our guest, Kyle Baker, his was a case involving two young girls, one lost in the world of drugs and commercial sex work while the other girl's life abruptly upended. This grim encounter lit a flame within Kyle, igniting a life-long journey battling human trafficking. Join us as he shares the invaluable lessons he's gained throughout his career, revealing how advocates and law enforcement can collaborate more effectively.
In our riveting conversation, we navigate the intricacies of working with survivors and law enforcement. Kyle emphasizes the urgent need to grasp the understanding of victimhood, trauma, and trauma bonds. He explores why the approach to combating human trafficking requires a different lens than traditional law enforcement investigations. Kyle expresses the necessity for quality training delivered by experienced professionals and survivors. Join us and equip yourself with the knowledge to make a real difference in the fight against human trafficking.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
You know the why human trafficking work is needed
To fight for the freedom ofmodern day slaves.
But love, passion, commitmentisn't all you need to be an
effective and successfulanti-trafficking advocate.
Learn the how.
I'm Dr Celia Williamson,Director of the Human
Trafficking and Social JusticeInstitute at the University of
(00:23):
Toledo.
Welcome to the EmancipationNation podcast, where I'll
provide you with the latest andbest methods, policy and
practice discussed byexperienced experts in the field
, so that you can cut throughthe noise, save time and be
about the work of saving lives.
Welcome to the EmancipationNation episode 188.
(00:44):
Today, my guest is Kyle Baker,and he really is an expert in
human trafficking, particularlyhaving worked with law
enforcement, having trained lawenforcement.
He has a certified humantrafficking course and he has
worked hundreds of commercialsexual investigations.
(01:05):
So because he is a teacher, atrainer around the state of
California, he has some lessonsthat he has learned over time
about building relationshipswith law enforcement as we are
advocates working in theanti-trafficking field, and some
of the barriers on both sidesand maybe some of the ways that
(01:29):
we could and law enforcementcould work together better.
So I think this is a veryimportant conversation.
So thank you so much for beinghere, Kyle.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Celia, thank you so much for having me and good
morning from California.
It's 6 am here, Excited to behere and chat with you a little
bit about human traffickingtoday.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Yeah, Kyle.
First of all, tell us how yougot involved in this particular
issue.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
So, to be 100% honest , totally by fate, in 2016.
So in 2016, I was selected as adetective.
I work for a police departmentin the Bay Area in California,
Almost if you drew a linebetween San Francisco and
Sacramento, I'm somewhere alongthat line, so right in the
(02:18):
middle of a very, very busy area.
And so in 2016, I was selectedas a narcotics detective and, of
course, I grew up watching allthe cop movies and I thought it
was going to be the craziest,coolest thing.
We're going to take down thesehuge drug kingpins and such.
And one day my boss walks intome and he says hey, Kyle, I have
(02:40):
something for you.
I'm like oh cool, you know what?
What are we doing today?
You know what kind of drugs?
Who is it?
And he's like well, it'sactually, it looks like a human
trafficking case.
And I'm like, well, what isthat?
And what had happened is one ofmy partners, who usually worked
those, was out of town.
And he said, hey, here's wherewe're at.
We have a 15 year old girlright now that's currently in
(03:04):
juvenile hall for some unrelatedcharges and she just disclosed
to one of the counselors therethat a couple of nights ago she
was taken to a hotel in a nearbycity that started off in our
city and she was photographedand she had those photographs
put online and there were drugsinvolved and we're not really
(03:28):
sure what's going on.
So I said, okay, well, let me,let me give it a shot.
Well, sure enough, that was myfirst human trafficking case and
what it involved was a 15 yearold who had run away from home.
She was picked up by two guysthat kind of loosely knew her
she had sadly been involved inthe commercial sex work prior to
(03:49):
that and that night they got ahotel room.
She ended up texting one of herbest friends who was in
volleyball practice at a nearbyschool.
They picked up a third guy,then picked up the second girl
and they all ended up in thisreally horrible CD hotel room.
One of the girls watched one ofthe guys shooting heroin into
(04:14):
his arm and asked to try it forthe first time, and that led to
a night of photographs and anight of commercial sex posting.
Now, luckily, in that particularnight, no commercial sex acts
ended up taking place.
However, here in Californiathey certainly met the threshold
for human trafficking and thatwas the first time I was really
(04:36):
exposed to what humantrafficking is, what it somewhat
looks like vulnerable types ofpopulations, how individuals can
truly manipulate others andjust how prolific it is.
So that's what launched me intothis and now has been my career
passion for gosh the last sevenyears to where I've worked on
(04:59):
human trafficking task force.
I've testified multiple timesas an expert in court.
I now travel and teach aroundthe state of California for
multiple organizations.
I speak to community groups.
It's been one heck of a rideand I'm excited to be where I am
now and truly sharing some ofthe successes but, more
(05:20):
importantly, the failures overthe years.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
And so, kyle, I mean I could hear the initial passion
in your voice about you know,I'm gonna get in there and we're
gonna do these big cases, man,and that sounds so exciting and
so cool.
And then, instead of like whatyou envisioned, something stole
your heart and caused you tohave this passion.
(05:46):
But what was it about thatexperience that made you then
you know, it changed thetrajectory of your life, I guess
to do this?
Speaker 2 (05:54):
So it was two things and really it was the two
victims in that case.
And what was really interesting, Celia is the two victims in
that case the original one thatwas picked up as a runaway and
the one that came from the highschool.
So the runaway she was whatwe've all spoken about many a
times, where you see a lot ofthose red flags, those areas of
(06:17):
vulnerability.
She came from a broken home,she had abuse in her past, she
had had drug use, so she waskind of on one hand.
On the other hand, the girlfrom the high school had none of
that inner history.
She came from a good home, goodfamily.
She had never been involved incommercial sex work, she had
never been exposed to drugs.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Hey, before we continue the episode, I wanna
let you know of three courses Ioffer Effective case management
with human trafficking survivors, the TNT survivor journey
groups and the best life humantrafficking prevention course
for girls that are at risk.
Raising awareness around humantrafficking is a great start
(06:58):
Hanging up flyers, havingfundraisers, doing human
trafficking presentations oreven joining an anti-trafficking
coalition or commission orstudent group but it simply
isn't enough.
If you or your group aren'ttouching the lives of survivors
or those at risk, and meaningful, in healing ways, you're
missing a critical component.
(07:19):
I want you to get back to thereasons you joined the
anti-trafficking fight in thefirst place, the reason you
joined that coalition or thatcommission or that student group
.
You wanted to make a difference, but maybe you didn't know
exactly what to do and sopresentations seem doable.
Why?
(07:40):
Because you had the knowledgeand skills to do it.
Well, if you're really ready toget directly involved and help
change the lives of others forthe better, then this is an
important message for you.
I have almost 30 years'experience working with
survivors and studying the issue, and I'm circling back to help
you become effective andconfident in your ability to
(08:03):
work with survivors ofcommercial sexual violence.
I wrote a few books, developedsome courses that would love to
train you on how to be involveddirectly.
Just go to my website,celiawaysoncom, and check out my
webinars.
Learn a little more about howyou can become knowledgeable and
(08:24):
skilled to actually work withsurvivors using my
trauma-informed courses.
And now on with the podcast.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
When I sat down and talked to both of them about
their experience, the traumathat had occurred from that
event was very apparent in bothof them, and so that was the
first time that I saw how humantrafficking, how exploiters, can
truly affect victims.
And for me, going from what Ithought I was gonna be doing,
(08:58):
which was running around chasingdrugs, I found that it's sad
that this exists, but there's ahuge man's satisfaction in being
able to do what we can forthose victims, because they're
real.
They're real people.
There's faces, there'sexperiences and there's trauma.
(09:19):
So for me, I thought you knowwhat this is?
I think maybe what I'm supposedto be doing, and it really just
kind of took off after that.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
Yeah, it's kind of difficult to look in a little
young face I say young faceteenagers and walk away to do
something else.
I mean that's pretty hard to do.
I can see how your passion tookover.
Did you happen to see?
I just this question popped inmy head out of the blue.
(09:48):
Did you happen to see the movieSound of Freedom?
I did, okay, because yourexperiences seem to match some
of my experiences and that moviereally talked about really
little kids in another country.
(10:10):
I mean, what's your opinionabout that?
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Yeah, I thought you might ask that because I'm sure,
just like you, I've beengetting tons of questions about
it from family, from friends,from coworkers, and my message
to that has been somewhat simplein that you know, cinematically
good movie, it kind of gripsyou and pulls you in and I think
(10:35):
that it's important in thesense that it does display some
of the unfortunate things thathappen in other countries and I
will never dispel that and Iwill never try to minimize that.
However, there's a big howeverwith that, because the truth is
is it's not a reflection at allabout what happens here in our
(10:59):
country.
And what I tell people all thetime, especially when I'm
speaking to community groups, isI promise you, no matter where
you live, what city you're in Idon't care if it's rural, I
don't care if it's huge, urban,I don't care what the
socioeconomics look like, Idon't care about any of that I
promise you.
You have seen victims of humantrafficking or commercial sex
(11:21):
crimes in your daily life, atStarbucks, at the grocery store,
at wherever.
And the truth is is you're muchmore likely to be exploited by
somebody who contacts you onsocial media and tells you
you're pretty, we should go outand make money.
Then somebody's snatching a kidoff of the street corner, and
(11:43):
so I think it's really importantfor folks here in the US.
I love that there's the pushand people are getting aware and
they're more hungry forinformation.
I think that's great, but inall reality we have to
understand that there's a lot ofbuilt-in vulnerabilities in our
young populations here in theUS and a lot of times, sadly,
(12:04):
those young victims are outsearching for something and
those exploiters know what thatis and they're able to
capitalize on it.
So overall, I mean a good moviefor what I think some of the
things that accomplished.
However, I think it's importantfor us here as moms and dads
and brothers and sisters andteachers and just everyday folks
(12:25):
understand what humantrafficking looks like here.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
I mean 100% agreed.
So I just like to ask people,because I don't want America
running off thinking that thatis what trafficking looks like.
That is one piece, one sliver,but there's things happening in
your own community that youcould open your eyes to, so I'm
so glad that you cleared that up.
(12:50):
So let's talk about some of thelaw enforcement things that
they could do better maybe somebarriers or how could we best
collaborate with law enforcementand they collaborate with us?
Speaker 2 (13:07):
One of my favorite topics to talk about because
I've had to learn a lot over theyears and I'll take this in two
strokes, the first one being, Ithink overall as a profession,
we have progressed significantlyover the years to where the
message certainly is now to lookat and treat commercial sex
(13:32):
workers as victims andunderstanding that the old adage
of well, they must be wantingto do that or they could just
pack up and leave.
I think that we've come a longway, learning from survivors,
learning from victim advocates,learning from people like me
that have fallen on my face afew times over the years.
(13:53):
We've gained that understandingof that victimhood, that trauma
, those trauma bonds.
I think we're getting there.
We're not all the way there yetby any means, but I think if
you look over the last couple ofdecades where we are now, we're
progressing a little bit.
But, with that being said, oneof the biggest pieces that I
(14:15):
truly preach and I harp on asmuch as I can if you look at any
let's call it traditional lawenforcement type of
investigation I'll use a robberyas an example.
Well, if I go to the scene of arobbery, more than likely the
way that that call for serviceis handled here in California is
probably the same that it'sgoing to be handled in Texas or
(14:38):
Oklahoma or Florida.
The book is kind of written onhow to handle a robbery as a
police officer.
We're still kind of writing thebook on how to investigate
human trafficking and commercialsex crimes because it's so
dynamic, because there's so muchthat goes into it and the piece
that I truly try to get acrossto police officers the most is
(15:02):
we cannot do it alone as lawenforcement.
We cannot, and the approach ofmulti-disciplinary collaboration
has to be the lens that we lookat this through.
When I started working almostexclusively with human
(15:22):
trafficking six, seven years ago, I knew that these wonderful
people called victim advocatesexisted and we had sometimes had
cross, either training or cross.
You know we would work withthese folks on different types
of cases, but it was neverreally intimately, it was never
(15:44):
really proper.
And as I started to crest thesecases I learned very quickly
that there are some alreadybuilt-in barriers between law
enforcement and victims of humantrafficking and the truth is a
lot of those are created by lawenforcement over the years.
(16:07):
For a long time we treatedcommercial sex work and victims
as prostitutes and it's taken along time for us to start to
gain that trust back.
So I think that that's a hugecomponent in understanding that
a victim advocate can be very,very vital to gain that trust
(16:28):
quicker, because it's notsomebody in uniform, it's not
law enforcement.
So that's definitely one of thebarriers in this type of work
is understanding that you knowus as law enforcement.
When we take a case on, we meeta victim.
We got a little bit of work todo right and in gaining that
trust and one of the best toolsto combat that is certainly
(16:49):
working with folks from victimadvocacy groups.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
Yeah, well, let me just comment on that.
First of all, I love that youmentioned trauma bond, because
it can look very different tosomebody who doesn't understand
trauma bond.
It looks like somebody who'sparticipating in there.
You know they want to do this,they want to be there, and so if
you don't understand traumabond, then you're looking at a
(17:14):
picture of something that you'regoing to assess in the wrong
way.
I also love that you said, hey,I've made mistakes fallen on my
face.
You know I certainly have.
I remember back in the day doingsome presentations and
conferences where lawenforcement was quite frankly
(17:35):
offended.
If you said, hey, maybe thatyou aren't doing this, maybe
this is triggering, maybe thisis re traumatizing people
vis-a-vis abuse is slightlyreally offended In my profession
and social work when we meetpeople and they say, hey, social
workers screwed up my life, wego, yeah, yeah, yeah, I
(17:56):
understand.
So we've come to accept thatall of us aren't doing what we
should.
We do the best with what wehave, but when you know better,
you do better.
So law enforcement coming tosome realization that we have
some growth to do.
But the key thing that you saidso far was really it's
(18:18):
multidisciplinary and if thelisteners go back and listen to
any of these episodes, they'llhear people say collaboration,
multidisciplinary.
Those are the people who arewise and know what to do.
The people who talk about I cando it, my agency can do it.
(18:40):
Those are the people thatreally have some growing to do.
So I'm just excited that youtalked about multidisciplinary,
because that's really the way tobe most successful.
So let me, let me, let youcontinue.
Any other barriers?
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Yeah, and so I think that the other component to that
is I certainly challenge myvictim advocate friends to also
understand that some of theirperceptions of law enforcement
or some of their pastexperiences shouldn't let them
not get to know their localofficers and the investigators
(19:20):
that they're working with,because that relationship, I
think, is extremely key.
I had a case one that'sadjudicated the exploiters
currently in prison where thefirst time that I met the victim
she was 18 years old at thetime and we came across her
through some investigative stepsand that particular day where
(19:42):
we first met her, we didn't haveaccess to a victim advocate
that day and so we just kind ofhad to roll with it the best
that we could.
And she was certainly in thatphase of the victim not wanting
anything to do with lawenforcement.
She was branded and tattooed,with her exploiters tattooed.
She was dressed as you wouldexpect somebody involved in this
(20:04):
type of work to be and she wasvery protective because she was
bonded to her exploiter.
Well, a few days later herexploiter broke into her
apartment as she was kind ofgoing through this phase of
trying to get away from him.
He broke into her apartment,pistol, whipped her new
(20:25):
boyfriend, who was not involvedin commercial sex or a Pamp or
an exploiter, held a gun to hishead and ended up being arrested
that night and that incidentkind of helped her get over that
kind of hump of wanting toprotect him.
Well, so one of the very firstthings that I did was bring a
(20:46):
victim advocate in on thatconversation and that case.
And that's one of those coolstories where post investigation
, post court etc.
She actually got out of thelife.
So I credit that 100 percent tothis amazing victim advocate
that works for the DA's officehere in the county that I work
(21:08):
in.
And it wasn't easy, for it wasdefinitely quite the road.
So I just I wanted to throwthat out there because you know
those, those successful storiesare really built around these
relationships.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean it's.
How do you you know, you'veworked hundreds of these cases
how do you, kyle, stay sort oflike healthy?
How do you take care ofyourself?
How do you see this?
Look into these faces, yeah,and see this tragedy and what
(21:41):
they've been through, and youand you know by now the the hard
road to healing that it's goingto take and what you know.
How do you take care ofyourself?
Haven't seen all that?
Speaker 2 (21:52):
Yeah, I appreciate that question.
Well, the first thing is ittook a lot of years to
understand this truth, andreality is that you are not
going to be able to helpeverybody, and that is a
difficult thing as somebodywho's in a profession where
that's kind of the guidingreason to why most cops get into
(22:14):
this profession is that theywant to help people in some way.
But, as you know truly quoterescuing a victim the truth is
is that a victim's never goingto leave their situation until
they're ready.
We, we in this profession, inlaw enforcement and advocacy and
social work, we can do all thatwe can.
(22:35):
We can provide the steps, wecan provide the path, but at the
end of the day, the decisiondoes end up having to lie with
that individual.
So for me, over the years, whenit comes to you know my personal
feelings that's been the mostdifficult thing, honestly, is
that I met so many victims overthe years that I just I want to
(22:56):
just grab them and just takethem out of the situation, put
them somewhere safe and be like,hey, take a look from the
outside, looking in, and lookwhat, look what you're doing to
yourself and look what'shappening.
So once, once, I've kind ofsettled into that and knowing
that, hey, us, collaboratively,we, we can only do the best that
(23:18):
we can, that that's somewhathelped a little bit.
But the truth is isunderstanding that I do have a
profession that I'm verypassionate about, but I do have
an entire life outside of myprofession and I think that
that's really important.
I have a family, I have youngchildren, I have hobbies, we
like to travel, and so I can'tsay that my brain always turns
(23:40):
off when I'm not at work.
However, I've learned over theyears to kind of have that
balance a little bit, and Ithink that that's extremely
important.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
Yeah, I mean we can all take a page out of your book
because we, I think a lot ofpeople are trying to establish
that work life balance or tryingto have some joy in their own
life after they've seen thistype of tragedy.
So what would you recommend youknow to other people,
(24:13):
particularly involved in lawenforcement, the people who show
up first, first responders, andthey see you know what's
happening, what.
What would you advise them interms of their own self care or
in terms of training they mayneed or anything that would help
them do their job better?
Speaker 2 (24:32):
Yeah, so I'll take the training on first.
So I talked to a lot of policeagencies and I've been very
fortunate over the years to talkto chiefs of police and higher
ups at different agencies,especially in our area, and I
cannot harp enough that thefundamental thing that we have
(24:54):
to do for our police officers iswe have to train them.
And we have to specificallytrain our patrol officers, the
guys and gals who are going togo to that call for service at a
hotel at two o'clock in themorning.
When somebody calls and saysyou know what?
We saw this.
It just doesn't look quiteright.
This girl, she looked reallyyoung, like what's going on.
(25:17):
And so to train our officersand deputies across the country
and be able to recognize thesesituations and understand how to
properly investigate them.
And the second thing that Ialways kind of throw in there is
okay, it's really great if youtrain your people.
I think that's extremelyimportant and I have a huge
proponent that that training itshould be from folks maybe like
(25:40):
me, that have had experience,that are cops et cetera.
But you should also have sometraining that comes from victim
advocates.
You should have some trainingthat comes from survivors.
So whenever I teach and train.
I do everything that I can tohave a survivor there to hear
their story, because I mean,let's face it, celia, I can talk
about this stuff and I canshare experiences, but when you
(26:01):
hear it from the mouth ofsomebody that's lived it,
totally different.
So we have to train our officersand then we have to have
pathways in our police agencieson how to navigate these cases.
So, okay, great, what if anofficer does a traffic stop and
it has all these red flags ofsome type of trafficking
(26:23):
situation, but ultimately youcan't get anywhere on that day.
You don't, nobody's talking toyou, there's nothing to take
anybody to jail for, the victimdoesn't, or a perceived victim
doesn't want to talk to you, andyou end up having to let these
folks go.
Well, what's the next step?
Who can you refer that to?
So I think that's extremelyimportant for police departments
(26:44):
train your people and havepathways to navigate these cases
.
And then the last component tothat and this is something law
enforcement has definitelyimproved on is our wellness
programs for officers, and hereat the agency I work for I work
for Pittsburgh Police Departmentwe have a relatively robust
wellness program which we'recontinuing to grow, where we
(27:07):
have access to peer supportofficers.
We just recently built a brandnew gym that we'll be doing on
duty workouts on, which I thinkis really important, and so it's
this overall notion thatofficers have to take care of
their mental health and theyhave to take care of their
physical health, so that allcomes into play right, because
(27:28):
if I am a more fit officer andI'm a more mentally healthy
officer, I'm gonna be able todeal with these situations
better.
So it really all does linktogether.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
So, kyle, if a police force or somebody who's
advocating for police to betrained, I mean, are you willing
, do you do training outside ofCalifornia?
Speaker 2 (27:53):
Yeah, so I haven't had the opportunity to travel
out of California yet justbecause there's honestly so much
training to be done here inCalifornia.
However, I'm always certainlywilling to do so and, on top of
that, I really enjoy.
I love training cops.
I've been doing it for gosh adecade, not only in human
(28:15):
trafficking but other areas, andnow human trafficking is what I
teach and travel or I shouldsay, travel and teach now but I
love speaking and talking togroups that are not law
enforcement as well.
I've done several trainings inour county with different social
work groups, with differentcommunity groups, with different
(28:36):
advocate groups, and I thinkthat that's really important
because, again, I truly feel oneof my missions now is to
continue to break down thosebarriers.
We kind of spoke about that.
Cops care and they do a prettygood job, and sometimes we just
(28:57):
need to be reminded as policeofficers that these type of
cases involve that collaboration.
So I'm certainly alwaysavailable, definitely find me on
LinkedIn and I'll definitelyshoot you some of my contact
information, but I'm a resourceand I love sharing things and,
(29:20):
again, I got a whole lot ofthings that I learned from over
the years.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Awesome, and just can you let us know where somebody
can contact you?
In case you know they don't seewhat I might put in the
description, but if somebodywanted to email you for a
particular training or message,you would they go to LinkedIn,
or do you have a site?
Speaker 2 (29:45):
LinkedIn's the best place to reach me and you can
just search my name, kyle Bakerand Human Trafficking, and it'll
pop up Also my email address,which I'll give you that you can
toss out there it's kbaker3071at gmailcom.
That's the main email that Iuse for any human trafficking
related stuff outside of workkind of.
(30:07):
But yeah, I'm definitelyavailable and you know, love to
have conversations.
I've gotten to speak to a lotof people, especially the last
couple of years, as I've startedto train more and teach more
and gotten to advise on somepretty cool projects.
And now you know I'm superhumbled and excited to be
(30:29):
working with TAT TruckersAgainst Trafficking.
That's a new venture for me as alaw enforcement advisor.
They are an absolutely amazingorganization all across North
America that are truly boots onthe ground and training Just.
I think they're the last figureI saw was upwards of a million
(30:52):
people in the trucking industryand they're now working with
moving companies.
They just have really takenover the transportation industry
and I'm super excited to workwith them on you know, projects
and getting to know them alittle bit better.
But they're definitely anorganization that has kind of
(31:16):
the right mindset and just truepassion.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Yeah Well, thank you so much, and Truckers Against
Trafficking is an amazingorganization.
I'm so glad that you areworking with them and thank you
so much for your time today andfor just telling us more about
human trafficking, commercialsexual exploitation, that you
know law enforcement can dobetter, how we can work best
(31:42):
with law enforcement, and yourwisdom on collaboration, on
talking always talking tovictims and survivors and
advocates, and always gettingtheir input, always including
them in the work that we do.
That message came through loudand clear.
So thank you so much, kyle,again, and appreciate what you
(32:06):
do and glad that you aretraveling with your family and
trying to stay as healthy as youcan when you can.
So thank you, I appreciate yourtime.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Thank you very much.
It was an absolute humblingopportunity.
I loved being here, and thelast thing I'll leave you with
that I always share with folkswhen I'm speaking about human
trafficking is we must not panic, but we must be aware and I
think that that's a veryimportant thing as we move
forward is understanding whatthis stuff is.
(32:36):
But let's not panic, let's justbe better and better educated.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
That was Kyle Baker, and he is an expert in the law
enforcement field, coming fromthat perspective, working with
survivors of trafficking and nowteaching and training other law
enforcement officers how to dothe same while he is working,
respecting and honoring theexperiences of other professions
(33:08):
and the lived experience andexpertise of lived experience
survivors.
So I think Kyle is the epitomeof what we're looking for as we
collaborate with law enforcement.
He gives us hope, for some ofus that have been jaded, perhaps
even by our experiences withlaw enforcement, that there are
(33:32):
law enforcement officers outthere doing a great job that are
passionate about what they do,that seek more knowledge, that
are interested in collaboration,and so let's do the same.
Are you always seeking moreknowledge?
Are you respectful and honoringof other professions that are
(33:57):
at the table?
Do you respect and honor andinclude lived experience
individuals?
Do you collaborate?
Do you even think collaborationis important?
Because, as I said, if youlisten to these episodes, one
theme rains loud and clear, andthat is the importance of
(34:18):
collaboration.
If you look over any socialmovement, not only in the US but
around the world, you'll seecollaboration.
You can't do it alone.
You have to allow others at thetable to help and then honor
(34:38):
and respect what they bring tothe table.
That is the key to success.
Until next time, the fightcontinues.
You know the why human trafficking work is needed
To fight for the freedom ofmodern day slaves.
But love, passion, commitmentisn't all you need to be an
effective and successfulanti-trafficking advocate.
Learn the how.
I'm Dr Celia Williamson,Director of the Human
Trafficking and Social JusticeInstitute at the University of
(00:23):
Toledo.
Welcome to the EmancipationNation podcast, where I'll
provide you with the latest andbest methods, policy and
practice discussed byexperienced experts in the field
, so that you can cut throughthe noise, save time and be
about the work of saving lives.
Welcome to the EmancipationNation episode 188.
(00:44):
Today, my guest is Kyle Baker,and he really is an expert in
human trafficking, particularlyhaving worked with law
enforcement, having trained lawenforcement.
He has a certified humantrafficking course and he has
worked hundreds of commercialsexual investigations.
(01:05):
So because he is a teacher, atrainer around the state of
California, he has some lessonsthat he has learned over time
about building relationshipswith law enforcement as we are
advocates working in theanti-trafficking field, and some
of the barriers on both sidesand maybe some of the ways that
(01:29):
we could and law enforcementcould work together better.
So I think this is a veryimportant conversation.
So thank you so much for beinghere, Kyle.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Celia, thank you so much for having me and good
morning from California.
It's 6 am here, Excited to behere and chat with you a little
bit about human traffickingtoday.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Yeah, Kyle.
First of all, tell us how yougot involved in this particular
issue.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
So, to be 100% honest , totally by fate, in 2016.
So in 2016, I was selected as adetective.
I work for a police departmentin the Bay Area in California,
Almost if you drew a linebetween San Francisco and
Sacramento, I'm somewhere alongthat line, so right in the
(02:18):
middle of a very, very busy area.
And so in 2016, I was selectedas a narcotics detective and, of
course, I grew up watching allthe cop movies and I thought it
was going to be the craziest,coolest thing.
We're going to take down thesehuge drug kingpins and such.
And one day my boss walks intome and he says hey, Kyle, I have
(02:40):
something for you.
I'm like oh cool, you know what?
What are we doing today?
You know what kind of drugs?
Who is it?
And he's like well, it'sactually, it looks like a human
trafficking case.
And I'm like, well, what isthat?
And what had happened is one ofmy partners, who usually worked
those, was out of town.
And he said, hey, here's wherewe're at.
We have a 15 year old girlright now that's currently in
(03:04):
juvenile hall for some unrelatedcharges and she just disclosed
to one of the counselors therethat a couple of nights ago she
was taken to a hotel in a nearbycity that started off in our
city and she was photographedand she had those photographs
put online and there were drugsinvolved and we're not really
(03:28):
sure what's going on.
So I said, okay, well, let me,let me give it a shot.
Well, sure enough, that was myfirst human trafficking case and
what it involved was a 15 yearold who had run away from home.
She was picked up by two guysthat kind of loosely knew her
she had sadly been involved inthe commercial sex work prior to
(03:49):
that and that night they got ahotel room.
She ended up texting one of herbest friends who was in
volleyball practice at a nearbyschool.
They picked up a third guy,then picked up the second girl
and they all ended up in thisreally horrible CD hotel room.
One of the girls watched one ofthe guys shooting heroin into
(04:14):
his arm and asked to try it forthe first time, and that led to
a night of photographs and anight of commercial sex posting.
Now, luckily, in that particularnight, no commercial sex acts
ended up taking place.
However, here in Californiathey certainly met the threshold
for human trafficking and thatwas the first time I was really
(04:36):
exposed to what humantrafficking is, what it somewhat
looks like vulnerable types ofpopulations, how individuals can
truly manipulate others andjust how prolific it is.
So that's what launched me intothis and now has been my career
passion for gosh the last sevenyears to where I've worked on
(04:59):
human trafficking task force.
I've testified multiple timesas an expert in court.
I now travel and teach aroundthe state of California for
multiple organizations.
I speak to community groups.
It's been one heck of a rideand I'm excited to be where I am
now and truly sharing some ofthe successes but, more
(05:20):
importantly, the failures overthe years.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
And so, kyle, I mean I could hear the initial passion
in your voice about you know,I'm gonna get in there and we're
gonna do these big cases, man,and that sounds so exciting and
so cool.
And then, instead of like whatyou envisioned, something stole
your heart and caused you tohave this passion.
(05:46):
But what was it about thatexperience that made you then
you know, it changed thetrajectory of your life, I guess
to do this?
Speaker 2 (05:54):
So it was two things and really it was the two
victims in that case.
And what was really interesting, Celia is the two victims in
that case the original one thatwas picked up as a runaway and
the one that came from the highschool.
So the runaway she was whatwe've all spoken about many a
times, where you see a lot ofthose red flags, those areas of
(06:17):
vulnerability.
She came from a broken home,she had abuse in her past, she
had had drug use, so she waskind of on one hand.
On the other hand, the girlfrom the high school had none of
that inner history.
She came from a good home, goodfamily.
She had never been involved incommercial sex work, she had
never been exposed to drugs.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Hey, before we continue the episode, I wanna
let you know of three courses Ioffer Effective case management
with human trafficking survivors, the TNT survivor journey
groups and the best life humantrafficking prevention course
for girls that are at risk.
Raising awareness around humantrafficking is a great start
(06:58):
Hanging up flyers, havingfundraisers, doing human
trafficking presentations oreven joining an anti-trafficking
coalition or commission orstudent group but it simply
isn't enough.
If you or your group aren'ttouching the lives of survivors
or those at risk, and meaningful, in healing ways, you're
missing a critical component.
(07:19):
I want you to get back to thereasons you joined the
anti-trafficking fight in thefirst place, the reason you
joined that coalition or thatcommission or that student group
.
You wanted to make a difference, but maybe you didn't know
exactly what to do and sopresentations seem doable.
Why?
(07:40):
Because you had the knowledgeand skills to do it.
Well, if you're really ready toget directly involved and help
change the lives of others forthe better, then this is an
important message for you.
I have almost 30 years'experience working with
survivors and studying the issue, and I'm circling back to help
you become effective andconfident in your ability to
(08:03):
work with survivors ofcommercial sexual violence.
I wrote a few books, developedsome courses that would love to
train you on how to be involveddirectly.
Just go to my website,celiawaysoncom, and check out my
webinars.
Learn a little more about howyou can become knowledgeable and
(08:24):
skilled to actually work withsurvivors using my
trauma-informed courses.
And now on with the podcast.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
When I sat down and talked to both of them about
their experience, the traumathat had occurred from that
event was very apparent in bothof them, and so that was the
first time that I saw how humantrafficking, how exploiters, can
truly affect victims.
And for me, going from what Ithought I was gonna be doing,
(08:58):
which was running around chasingdrugs, I found that it's sad
that this exists, but there's ahuge man's satisfaction in being
able to do what we can forthose victims, because they're
real.
They're real people.
There's faces, there'sexperiences and there's trauma.
(09:19):
So for me, I thought you knowwhat this is?
I think maybe what I'm supposedto be doing, and it really just
kind of took off after that.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
Yeah, it's kind of difficult to look in a little
young face I say young faceteenagers and walk away to do
something else.
I mean that's pretty hard to do.
I can see how your passion tookover.
Did you happen to see?
I just this question popped inmy head out of the blue.
(09:48):
Did you happen to see the movieSound of Freedom?
I did, okay, because yourexperiences seem to match some
of my experiences and that moviereally talked about really
little kids in another country.
(10:10):
I mean, what's your opinionabout that?
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Yeah, I thought you might ask that because I'm sure,
just like you, I've beengetting tons of questions about
it from family, from friends,from coworkers, and my message
to that has been somewhat simplein that you know, cinematically
good movie, it kind of gripsyou and pulls you in and I think
(10:35):
that it's important in thesense that it does display some
of the unfortunate things thathappen in other countries and I
will never dispel that and Iwill never try to minimize that.
However, there's a big howeverwith that, because the truth is
is it's not a reflection at allabout what happens here in our
(10:59):
country.
And what I tell people all thetime, especially when I'm
speaking to community groups, isI promise you, no matter where
you live, what city you're in Idon't care if it's rural, I
don't care if it's huge, urban,I don't care what the
socioeconomics look like, Idon't care about any of that I
promise you.
You have seen victims of humantrafficking or commercial sex
(11:21):
crimes in your daily life, atStarbucks, at the grocery store,
at wherever.
And the truth is is you're muchmore likely to be exploited by
somebody who contacts you onsocial media and tells you
you're pretty, we should go outand make money.
Then somebody's snatching a kidoff of the street corner, and
(11:43):
so I think it's really importantfor folks here in the US.
I love that there's the pushand people are getting aware and
they're more hungry forinformation.
I think that's great, but inall reality we have to
understand that there's a lot ofbuilt-in vulnerabilities in our
young populations here in theUS and a lot of times, sadly,
(12:04):
those young victims are outsearching for something and
those exploiters know what thatis and they're able to
capitalize on it.
So overall, I mean a good moviefor what I think some of the
things that accomplished.
However, I think it's importantfor us here as moms and dads
and brothers and sisters andteachers and just everyday folks
(12:25):
understand what humantrafficking looks like here.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
I mean 100% agreed.
So I just like to ask people,because I don't want America
running off thinking that thatis what trafficking looks like.
That is one piece, one sliver,but there's things happening in
your own community that youcould open your eyes to, so I'm
so glad that you cleared that up.
(12:50):
So let's talk about some of thelaw enforcement things that
they could do better maybe somebarriers or how could we best
collaborate with law enforcementand they collaborate with us?
Speaker 2 (13:07):
One of my favorite topics to talk about because
I've had to learn a lot over theyears and I'll take this in two
strokes, the first one being, Ithink overall as a profession,
we have progressed significantlyover the years to where the
message certainly is now to lookat and treat commercial sex
(13:32):
workers as victims andunderstanding that the old adage
of well, they must be wantingto do that or they could just
pack up and leave.
I think that we've come a longway, learning from survivors,
learning from victim advocates,learning from people like me
that have fallen on my face afew times over the years.
(13:53):
We've gained that understandingof that victimhood, that trauma
, those trauma bonds.
I think we're getting there.
We're not all the way there yetby any means, but I think if
you look over the last couple ofdecades where we are now, we're
progressing a little bit.
But, with that being said, oneof the biggest pieces that I
(14:15):
truly preach and I harp on asmuch as I can if you look at any
let's call it traditional lawenforcement type of
investigation I'll use a robberyas an example.
Well, if I go to the scene of arobbery, more than likely the
way that that call for serviceis handled here in California is
probably the same that it'sgoing to be handled in Texas or
(14:38):
Oklahoma or Florida.
The book is kind of written onhow to handle a robbery as a
police officer.
We're still kind of writing thebook on how to investigate
human trafficking and commercialsex crimes because it's so
dynamic, because there's so muchthat goes into it and the piece
that I truly try to get acrossto police officers the most is
(15:02):
we cannot do it alone as lawenforcement.
We cannot, and the approach ofmulti-disciplinary collaboration
has to be the lens that we lookat this through.
When I started working almostexclusively with human
(15:22):
trafficking six, seven years ago, I knew that these wonderful
people called victim advocatesexisted and we had sometimes had
cross, either training or cross.
You know we would work withthese folks on different types
of cases, but it was neverreally intimately, it was never
(15:44):
really proper.
And as I started to crest thesecases I learned very quickly
that there are some alreadybuilt-in barriers between law
enforcement and victims of humantrafficking and the truth is a
lot of those are created by lawenforcement over the years.
(16:07):
For a long time we treatedcommercial sex work and victims
as prostitutes and it's taken along time for us to start to
gain that trust back.
So I think that that's a hugecomponent in understanding that
a victim advocate can be very,very vital to gain that trust
(16:28):
quicker, because it's notsomebody in uniform, it's not
law enforcement.
So that's definitely one of thebarriers in this type of work
is understanding that you knowus as law enforcement.
When we take a case on, we meeta victim.
We got a little bit of work todo right and in gaining that
trust and one of the best toolsto combat that is certainly
(16:49):
working with folks from victimadvocacy groups.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
Yeah, well, let me just comment on that.
First of all, I love that youmentioned trauma bond, because
it can look very different tosomebody who doesn't understand
trauma bond.
It looks like somebody who'sparticipating in there.
You know they want to do this,they want to be there, and so if
you don't understand traumabond, then you're looking at a
(17:14):
picture of something that you'regoing to assess in the wrong
way.
I also love that you said, hey,I've made mistakes fallen on my
face.
You know I certainly have.
I remember back in the day doingsome presentations and
conferences where lawenforcement was quite frankly
(17:35):
offended.
If you said, hey, maybe thatyou aren't doing this, maybe
this is triggering, maybe thisis re traumatizing people
vis-a-vis abuse is slightlyreally offended In my profession
and social work when we meetpeople and they say, hey, social
workers screwed up my life, wego, yeah, yeah, yeah, I
(17:56):
understand.
So we've come to accept thatall of us aren't doing what we
should.
We do the best with what wehave, but when you know better,
you do better.
So law enforcement coming tosome realization that we have
some growth to do.
But the key thing that you saidso far was really it's
(18:18):
multidisciplinary and if thelisteners go back and listen to
any of these episodes, they'llhear people say collaboration,
multidisciplinary.
Those are the people who arewise and know what to do.
The people who talk about I cando it, my agency can do it.
(18:40):
Those are the people thatreally have some growing to do.
So I'm just excited that youtalked about multidisciplinary,
because that's really the way tobe most successful.
So let me, let me, let youcontinue.
Any other barriers?
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Yeah, and so I think that the other component to that
is I certainly challenge myvictim advocate friends to also
understand that some of theirperceptions of law enforcement
or some of their pastexperiences shouldn't let them
not get to know their localofficers and the investigators
(19:20):
that they're working with,because that relationship, I
think, is extremely key.
I had a case one that'sadjudicated the exploiters
currently in prison where thefirst time that I met the victim
she was 18 years old at thetime and we came across her
through some investigative stepsand that particular day where
(19:42):
we first met her, we didn't haveaccess to a victim advocate
that day and so we just kind ofhad to roll with it the best
that we could.
And she was certainly in thatphase of the victim not wanting
anything to do with lawenforcement.
She was branded and tattooed,with her exploiters tattooed.
She was dressed as you wouldexpect somebody involved in this
(20:04):
type of work to be and she wasvery protective because she was
bonded to her exploiter.
Well, a few days later herexploiter broke into her
apartment as she was kind ofgoing through this phase of
trying to get away from him.
He broke into her apartment,pistol, whipped her new
(20:25):
boyfriend, who was not involvedin commercial sex or a Pamp or
an exploiter, held a gun to hishead and ended up being arrested
that night and that incidentkind of helped her get over that
kind of hump of wanting toprotect him.
Well, so one of the very firstthings that I did was bring a
(20:46):
victim advocate in on thatconversation and that case.
And that's one of those coolstories where post investigation
, post court etc.
She actually got out of thelife.
So I credit that 100 percent tothis amazing victim advocate
that works for the DA's officehere in the county that I work
(21:08):
in.
And it wasn't easy, for it wasdefinitely quite the road.
So I just I wanted to throwthat out there because you know
those, those successful storiesare really built around these
relationships.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean it's.
How do you you know, you'veworked hundreds of these cases
how do you, kyle, stay sort oflike healthy?
How do you take care ofyourself?
How do you see this?
Look into these faces, yeah,and see this tragedy and what
(21:41):
they've been through, and youand you know by now the the hard
road to healing that it's goingto take and what you know.
How do you take care ofyourself?
Haven't seen all that?
Speaker 2 (21:52):
Yeah, I appreciate that question.
Well, the first thing is ittook a lot of years to
understand this truth, andreality is that you are not
going to be able to helpeverybody, and that is a
difficult thing as somebodywho's in a profession where
that's kind of the guidingreason to why most cops get into
(22:14):
this profession is that theywant to help people in some way.
But, as you know truly quoterescuing a victim the truth is
is that a victim's never goingto leave their situation until
they're ready.
We, we in this profession, inlaw enforcement and advocacy and
social work, we can do all thatwe can.
(22:35):
We can provide the steps, wecan provide the path, but at the
end of the day, the decisiondoes end up having to lie with
that individual.
So for me, over the years, whenit comes to you know my personal
feelings that's been the mostdifficult thing, honestly, is
that I met so many victims overthe years that I just I want to
(22:56):
just grab them and just takethem out of the situation, put
them somewhere safe and be like,hey, take a look from the
outside, looking in, and lookwhat, look what you're doing to
yourself and look what'shappening.
So once, once, I've kind ofsettled into that and knowing
that, hey, us, collaboratively,we, we can only do the best that
(23:18):
we can, that that's somewhathelped a little bit.
But the truth is isunderstanding that I do have a
profession that I'm verypassionate about, but I do have
an entire life outside of myprofession and I think that
that's really important.
I have a family, I have youngchildren, I have hobbies, we
like to travel, and so I can'tsay that my brain always turns
(23:40):
off when I'm not at work.
However, I've learned over theyears to kind of have that
balance a little bit, and Ithink that that's extremely
important.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
Yeah, I mean we can all take a page out of your book
because we, I think a lot ofpeople are trying to establish
that work life balance or tryingto have some joy in their own
life after they've seen thistype of tragedy.
So what would you recommend youknow to other people,
(24:13):
particularly involved in lawenforcement, the people who show
up first, first responders, andthey see you know what's
happening, what.
What would you advise them interms of their own self care or
in terms of training they mayneed or anything that would help
them do their job better?
Speaker 2 (24:32):
Yeah, so I'll take the training on first.
So I talked to a lot of policeagencies and I've been very
fortunate over the years to talkto chiefs of police and higher
ups at different agencies,especially in our area, and I
cannot harp enough that thefundamental thing that we have
(24:54):
to do for our police officers iswe have to train them.
And we have to specificallytrain our patrol officers, the
guys and gals who are going togo to that call for service at a
hotel at two o'clock in themorning.
When somebody calls and saysyou know what?
We saw this.
It just doesn't look quiteright.
This girl, she looked reallyyoung, like what's going on.
(25:17):
And so to train our officersand deputies across the country
and be able to recognize thesesituations and understand how to
properly investigate them.
And the second thing that Ialways kind of throw in there is
okay, it's really great if youtrain your people.
I think that's extremelyimportant and I have a huge
proponent that that training itshould be from folks maybe like
(25:40):
me, that have had experience,that are cops et cetera.
But you should also have sometraining that comes from victim
advocates.
You should have some trainingthat comes from survivors.
So whenever I teach and train.
I do everything that I can tohave a survivor there to hear
their story, because I mean,let's face it, celia, I can talk
about this stuff and I canshare experiences, but when you
(26:01):
hear it from the mouth ofsomebody that's lived it,
totally different.
So we have to train our officersand then we have to have
pathways in our police agencieson how to navigate these cases.
So, okay, great, what if anofficer does a traffic stop and
it has all these red flags ofsome type of trafficking
(26:23):
situation, but ultimately youcan't get anywhere on that day.
You don't, nobody's talking toyou, there's nothing to take
anybody to jail for, the victimdoesn't, or a perceived victim
doesn't want to talk to you, andyou end up having to let these
folks go.
Well, what's the next step?
Who can you refer that to?
So I think that's extremelyimportant for police departments
(26:44):
train your people and havepathways to navigate these cases
.
And then the last component tothat and this is something law
enforcement has definitelyimproved on is our wellness
programs for officers, and hereat the agency I work for I work
for Pittsburgh Police Departmentwe have a relatively robust
wellness program which we'recontinuing to grow, where we
(27:07):
have access to peer supportofficers.
We just recently built a brandnew gym that we'll be doing on
duty workouts on, which I thinkis really important, and so it's
this overall notion thatofficers have to take care of
their mental health and theyhave to take care of their
physical health, so that allcomes into play right, because
(27:28):
if I am a more fit officer andI'm a more mentally healthy
officer, I'm gonna be able todeal with these situations
better.
So it really all does linktogether.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
So, kyle, if a police force or somebody who's
advocating for police to betrained, I mean, are you willing
, do you do training outside ofCalifornia?
Speaker 2 (27:53):
Yeah, so I haven't had the opportunity to travel
out of California yet justbecause there's honestly so much
training to be done here inCalifornia.
However, I'm always certainlywilling to do so and, on top of
that, I really enjoy.
I love training cops.
I've been doing it for gosh adecade, not only in human
(28:15):
trafficking but other areas, andnow human trafficking is what I
teach and travel or I shouldsay, travel and teach now but I
love speaking and talking togroups that are not law
enforcement as well.
I've done several trainings inour county with different social
work groups, with differentcommunity groups, with different
(28:36):
advocate groups, and I thinkthat that's really important
because, again, I truly feel oneof my missions now is to
continue to break down thosebarriers.
We kind of spoke about that.
Cops care and they do a prettygood job, and sometimes we just
(28:57):
need to be reminded as policeofficers that these type of
cases involve that collaboration.
So I'm certainly alwaysavailable, definitely find me on
LinkedIn and I'll definitelyshoot you some of my contact
information, but I'm a resourceand I love sharing things and,
(29:20):
again, I got a whole lot ofthings that I learned from over
the years.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Awesome, and just can you let us know where somebody
can contact you?
In case you know they don't seewhat I might put in the
description, but if somebodywanted to email you for a
particular training or message,you would they go to LinkedIn,
or do you have a site?
Speaker 2 (29:45):
LinkedIn's the best place to reach me and you can
just search my name, kyle Bakerand Human Trafficking, and it'll
pop up Also my email address,which I'll give you that you can
toss out there it's kbaker3071at gmailcom.
That's the main email that Iuse for any human trafficking
related stuff outside of workkind of.
(30:07):
But yeah, I'm definitelyavailable and you know, love to
have conversations.
I've gotten to speak to a lotof people, especially the last
couple of years, as I've startedto train more and teach more
and gotten to advise on somepretty cool projects.
And now you know I'm superhumbled and excited to be
(30:29):
working with TAT TruckersAgainst Trafficking.
That's a new venture for me as alaw enforcement advisor.
They are an absolutely amazingorganization all across North
America that are truly boots onthe ground and training Just.
I think they're the last figureI saw was upwards of a million
(30:52):
people in the trucking industryand they're now working with
moving companies.
They just have really takenover the transportation industry
and I'm super excited to workwith them on you know, projects
and getting to know them alittle bit better.
But they're definitely anorganization that has kind of
(31:16):
the right mindset and just truepassion.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Yeah Well, thank you so much, and Truckers Against
Trafficking is an amazingorganization.
I'm so glad that you areworking with them and thank you
so much for your time today andfor just telling us more about
human trafficking, commercialsexual exploitation, that you
know law enforcement can dobetter, how we can work best
(31:42):
with law enforcement, and yourwisdom on collaboration, on
talking always talking tovictims and survivors and
advocates, and always gettingtheir input, always including
them in the work that we do.
That message came through loudand clear.
So thank you so much, kyle,again, and appreciate what you
(32:06):
do and glad that you aretraveling with your family and
trying to stay as healthy as youcan when you can.
So thank you, I appreciate yourtime.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Thank you very much.
It was an absolute humblingopportunity.
I loved being here, and thelast thing I'll leave you with
that I always share with folkswhen I'm speaking about human
trafficking is we must not panic, but we must be aware and I
think that that's a veryimportant thing as we move
forward is understanding whatthis stuff is.
(32:36):
But let's not panic, let's justbe better and better educated.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
That was Kyle Baker, and he is an expert in the law
enforcement field, coming fromthat perspective, working with
survivors of trafficking and nowteaching and training other law
enforcement officers how to dothe same while he is working,
respecting and honoring theexperiences of other professions
(33:08):
and the lived experience andexpertise of lived experience
survivors.
So I think Kyle is the epitomeof what we're looking for as we
collaborate with law enforcement.
He gives us hope, for some ofus that have been jaded, perhaps
even by our experiences withlaw enforcement, that there are
(33:32):
law enforcement officers outthere doing a great job that are
passionate about what they do,that seek more knowledge, that
are interested in collaboration,and so let's do the same.
Are you always seeking moreknowledge?
Are you respectful and honoringof other professions that are
(33:57):
at the table?
Do you respect and honor andinclude lived experience
individuals?
Do you collaborate?
Do you even think collaborationis important?
Because, as I said, if youlisten to these episodes, one
theme rains loud and clear, andthat is the importance of
(34:18):
collaboration.
If you look over any socialmovement, not only in the US but
around the world, you'll seecollaboration.
You can't do it alone.
You have to allow others at thetable to help and then honor
(34:38):
and respect what they bring tothe table.
That is the key to success.
Until next time, the fightcontinues.
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