Human Trafficking

Police Warn that Airbnb Rentals are Being Used for Human Trafficking

Written on behalf of Barrison Law

Airbnb has become an immensely popular avenue used by individuals to list their homes and apartments for others to use when vacationing. Nevertheless, Toronto police have found an increase in pimps using Airbnb rentals in recent years. Human traffickers may choose to use Airbnb rentals instead of motels due to the greater likelihood for anonymity. Detective Sergeant Nunzio Tramontozzi has stated:

There has to be more due diligence on the part of the … people that are renting out their properties. We have a good relationship with Airbnb. We have brought our concerns to them, and they’re working with us to try and rid pimps of using their properties in Toronto.

RECENT CASE OF ALLEGED HUMAN TRAFFICKING

In mid-February, Toronto police arrested two men who are alleged to have forced a 19-year-old woman into the sex trade for more than a month, running most of their business at various Airbnb properties in the Greater Toronto Area. The men are facing 58 charges, including human trafficking charges. Police allege that the men took the woman’s identification and forced her to turn over all the money she earned to them. When the woman got into an argument with the two men and told them she no longer wanted to work as an escort, one of the men pointed a firearm at her face. A shot was fired and the woman was shot in the buttocks area. The men then transported her to several addresses in the GTA. The woman finally escaped and sought medical attention at a hospital in Brampton.

WHAT IS HUMAN TRAFFICKING?

Human trafficking involves the exploitation for profit of a person through force, fraud, or coercion. Victims are mostly women and children who are forced to provide their labour or sexual services. Exploitation often occurs through intimidation, force, psychological manipulation, emotional abuse, lies, addiction, sexual assault, isolation, taking control of their ID and money, and threats of violence to themselves or their families.

Ontario is a major centre for human trafficking in Canada, with approximately two-thirds of reported cases arising in Ontario. Girls as young as 13 are being recruited by pimps into a world of unpaid sex work, often recruited on social media or at public places like shopping malls and playgrounds. The relationship usually begins as a romantic one and then the pimps ask the girls to perform sexual services on clients as a favour and with the promise of financial reward. Over time, the pimps threaten violence, take away their phones and ID and offer the girls hard drugs.

Human trafficking is an offence found in the Criminal Code of Canada (“CC”) and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

The CC includes four indictable offences to address human trafficking, including:

  • Trafficking in persons (section 279.01);
  • Trafficking of a person under the age of eighteen years (section 279.011);
  • Receiving financial or material benefit knowing it results from the commission of an offence under sections 279.01 and 279.011 (section 279.02); and
  • Withholding or destroying documents (section 279.03).

There are many other offences contained in the CC that also apply to human trafficking cases including kidnapping, forcible confinement, uttering threats, extortion, assault, sexual assault, prostitution related offences and criminal organization offences.

The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act contains a provision that prohibits the bringing into Canada of persons by means of abduction, fraud, deception or use of threat of force or coercion. Section 118 of this Act includes this provision with the accused facing a maximum penalty of a fine up to $1 million and/or up to life imprisonment.

If you have been charged with human trafficking or a related charge or have any questions regarding your legal rights, please contact the experienced criminal lawyers at Barrison Law online or at 905-404-1947. We have a 24-hour phone service for your convenience. We are available when you need us most.