#child sex trafficking

Ho‘ōla Nā Pua, a Hawai‘i-based nonprofit dedicated to the prevention of child sex trafficking and the healing of exploited youth, announced the appointment of Shelley Cramer as Chief Executive Officer.

The Hawai’i Department of the Attorney General and the Hawai’i Department of Human Services today announced the results of a multiagency child recovery operation conducted over the past weekend, known as Operation Shine the Light. The state agencies worked jointly with the Honolulu Police Department, as well as the US Department of Homeland Security’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and Susannah Wesley Community Center, to locate, recover and provide immediate services to endangered missing children and youth reported as “runaways” across Oʻahu. 

Locally, FBI agents identified and located seven adolescent victims during this operation that ran on Aug. 12, 2022.

US Senator Maizie Hirono has asked FBI director Christopher Wray to pay special attention to the safety of Native Hawaiian women and girls, in view of recent statistics showing they represent more than two-thirds of sex trafficking victims in Hawaiʻi.