Traffickers control their victims and keep them from escaping. They may do this through physical abuse, threats to the victims or their families, debt bondage, confinement, confiscating legal or identity documents, and/or psychologically manipulating them into thinking that they can’t leave.
Victims may not understand what trafficking is or know that it’s illegal.
Traffickers may have convinced their victims that they can’t make it on their own, or that people who could help them—such as law enforcement—should be feared.
Victims also may develop strong emotional and psychological bonds to their traffickers as a result of physical and emotional abuse.