Methods of Sex Trafficking Findings Demir

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Methods of sex trafficking: findings of a case study in Turkey

Oguzhan Omer Demira
a
International Center for Terrorism and Transnational Crime (UTSAM), Turkish National Police
Academy, Ankara, Turkey
Online publication date: 02 August 2010
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Crime, 11: 3, 314 — 335
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Global Crime
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Methods of sex trafficking: findings of

a case study in Turkey
Oguzhan Omer Demir*
Global
O.O. Crime
Demir
International Center for Terrorism and Transnational Crime (UTSAM),

Turkish National Police Academy, Ankara, Turkey
The underground sex industry in Turkey has increasingly become dependent on the
foreign women, predominantly coming from the former Soviet Union. Some of
these women became victims of sex trafficking. However, little is known about how
Downloaded By: [TÜBTAK EKUAL] At: 11:59 2 August 2010
they are recruited, transferred to, and exploited in Turkey. This article attempts to
enlighten this process and makes use of police-recorded victim interviews
(N = 430), as well as key personnel interviews (N = 18) as primary data. Various
methods and tactics are found to be used in sex trafficking operations in Turkey.
Most victims are recruited by persons known to them proposing attractive job possi-
bilities, especially in the entertainment business. The majority of victims enter Tur-
key with legal documents and with various transportation means. Traffickers obtain
girls and sell them to customers in public and private settings using methods to con-
trol the victims, such as debt bondage, violence, confinement, confiscation of travel
documents, and threats.
Keywords: human trafficking; sex trafficking; methods of trafficking; recruitment;
exploitation; Turkey
Introduction
The collapse of the Soviet Union has brought many disadvantages for the nationals of the
former Soviet Union (FSU) countries. One of these problems is the trafficking of women
for the purpose of sexual exploitation. Many FSU nationals sought ways of working
abroad as professionals; however, many others have been transferred to European coun-
tries for sex work. One of the countries where those women looked for job opportunities
was Turkey.
The underground sex industry in Turkey has increasingly become dependent on the
foreign women, predominantly coming from the FSU. This industry has been abused by
individuals or criminal groups who brought girls and women from FSU and forced them
to perform sex work. According to the Turkish National Police statistics, majority of
trafficked women were from FSU, of which Moldovan, Ukrainian, Russian, Uzbek, and
Turkmen nationals comprised the largest portions of all.
*Email: oodemir@egm.gov.tr
ISSN 1744-0572 print/ISSN 1744-0580 online

© 2010 Taylor & Francis
DOI: 10.1080/17440572.2010.490636
http://www.informaworld.com
Global Crime 315
Scholarly studies1 and many official and international reports2 as well as media
reports3 in the last decade have increased our body of knowledge about the methods of
trafficking for sexual exploitation. Existing studies and reports regarding human traffick-
ing in Turkey, however, have not addressed the methods that traffickers use to recruit,
transfer, and control women for sexual exploitation. This article attempts to fill this gap
and contribute to the human trafficking literature using victim- and official-based primary
data to explore the various stages of trafficking and methods used.
Literature review
Recruitment methods of traffickers
Various methods are used by traffickers to find and recruit suitable persons. Most victims
are recruited by their close friends and even by their own families. In addition, various
recruitment methods are carried out through advertisements, travel agencies, or marriage
agencies. Kidnapping is also a rare but documented conscription method.
The most common technique of gaining access to victims is through girlfriends,
boyfriends, neighbours, and relatives.4 A study on trafficked children in Moldova, for

example, refers to the fact that sometimes children or their families approach to the
traffickers when the pressure of motivating factors to leave the country is too high.
Another fact is that trafficked girls surveyed in this study indicated that their parents
did not stop them when they decided to leave.5 In a study about child trafficking in
Albania, 90% of families are in an agreement with the recruiter. As far as the family/
1. Amy O’Neill Richard, International Trafficking in Women to the United States: A Contemporary
Manifestation of Slavery and Organized Crime (DCI Exceptional Intelligence Analyst Program, An
Intelligence Monograph; Washington, DC: Central Intelligence Agency, 1999); Elizabeth Kelly and
Linda Regan, Stopping Traffic: Exploring the Extent Of, and Responses To, Trafficking in Women for
Sexual Exploitation in the UK’ Police Research Series, Paper 125 (London, UK: Home Office, 2000);
Anette Brunovskis and Gurri Tyldum, Crossing Borders, an Empirical Study of Transnational Prosti-
tution and Trafficking in Human Beings (Norway: Fafo, 2004); Greame Newman, The Exploitation of
Trafficked Women (Problem-Oriented Guides for Police Problem-Specific Guides Series, No. 38;
Washington, DC: Department of Justice, 2006); Edward Shauer and Elizabeth Wheaton, ‘Sex Trafficking
into the United States: A Literature Review’, Criminal Justice Review 31 (2006): 146.
2. International Organization for Migration, Trafficking of Women and Children for the Purpose of
Sexual Exploitation in Croatia; United Nations Children’s Fund, Trafficking in Children in Kosovo:
A Study on Protection and Assistance Provided to Children Victims of Trafficking (Kosovo:
UNICEF, 2004); United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute, Trafficking in
Women from Romania into Germany (Bucharest, Berlin: UNICRI, 2005); and United Nations Office
for Drugs and Crime, Trafficking in Persons Report: Global Patterns (Vienna: UNODC, 2006).
3. Vatan Istihbarat, ‘Lüks Otele 10 Kadin Gönderdim’ (Translated by the author into English as ‘I
Sent 10 Women to the Luxury Hotel’), Vatan Gazete, February 27, 2008; Sozcu, ‘Kleopatra Temi-
zligi’ (Translated by the author into English as ‘Cleopatra Cleaning’), Sözcu Gazetesi, May 05,
2008; and Bugün, ‘Cepten Kadin Ticareti, (Translated by the author into English as ‘Women Trade
Via Cell Phone’), Bugün Gazetesi, January 1, 2008.
4 .James Finckenauer, ‘Russian Transnational Organized Crime and Human Trafficking’, in Global
Human Smuggling: Comparative Perspectives, ed. David Kyle and Rey Koslowski (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001); Donna Hughes, Trafficking for Sexual Exploitation: The
Case of the Russian Federation (Geneva: IOM Press, 2002); and United Nations Children’s Fund,
Trafficking in Human Beings in Southern Europe (Federal Republic of Yugoslavia: UNICEF, 2002).
5 .International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour, Rapid Assessment of Trafficking in
Children for Labour and Sexual Exploitation in Moldova (Chisinau: IPEC, 2003) International Pro-
gramme on the Elimination of Child Labour, Rapid Assessment of Trafficking in Children for
Labour and Sexual Exploitation in Ukraine (Kiev: IPEC, 2003).
316 O.O. Demir
parent consent is given, families are paid some amount of money in exchange of their
children.6
Traffickers or intermediaries, acting as if they want to assist girls and women, but in
reality wanting to deceive them and abuse their vulnerable positions, tell the prospective
victims success stories of women who go abroad and earn lots of money. Female recruit-
ers are more convincing than men because ‘they show up in luxury cars, wearing a lot of
golden jewels and telling all sorts of stories about the beautiful life in the West’.7
The situation becomes more complex when victims decide to go back to sex work in a
foreign country where they are rescued and securely returned to their homelands describes
a Nepalese woman who was forced into prostitution for years and then decided to continue
sex work as a profession8:
Why would I want to return to Nepal? I have friends here, I make good money. In Nepal what
would I do? Look after goats and have no money! I’m good at my job and I know it. I don’t
want to return to Nepal.
One possible ‘re-entry scenario describes the situation of a woman who, having
escaped or having been released from debt bondage as a forced prostitute, believing that
alternative forms of employment would be unavailable to her due to the social stigma
against former prostitutes’.9 Re-entry might occur due to economic difficulties; however,
other reasons such as limited options and several ways of continuous coercion might also
influence the decision. It might be the case especially when legal and social mechanisms,
both in source and in destination countries, are missing or limited.
One of the ways of attracting people for trafficking purposes is through newspaper
advertisements that promise lucrative employment opportunities abroad for low-skilled jobs
such as waitress, nannies, fruit gatherers, cooks, saleswomen, night nurses, or secretaries.
Twenty percent of trafficked women are thought to be recruited by media advertisements.10
Victims are also recruited by travel agencies that seem legal but are in fact operating
illegally. These businesses provide people with legal documents such as working permits,
visas, and passports to the destination countries. In tandem with illegal networks in the
destination countries, they help to get people to the destination countries. For example, in
Moldova, most travel agencies are unlicensed and they routinely provide false visas and
other types of travel documents.11
Use of marriage agencies is another method of recruiting trafficking victims. Young
girls, desperate wives, or widows looking for opportunities to go abroad and get married for
a wealthy life sign up with these agencies. It is reported that hundreds of marriage agencies
are operating in eastern European countries.12 These agencies are mostly internet-based
6. International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour, Rapid Assessment of Trafficking in

Children for Labour and Sexual Exploitation in Albania (Tirana: IPEC, 2003).
Sexual Exploitation in Croatia.
8. Kate Butcher, ‘Confusion between Sex Work and Sex Trafficking’, Lancet 361 (2003): 1983.
9. Janie Chuang, ‘Redirecting the Debate over Trafficking in Women: Definitions, Paradigms, and
Contexts’, Harvard Human Rights Journal 11 (1998): 90.
10. Donna Hughes, Trafficking for Sexual Exploitation: The Case of the Russian Federation
(Geneva: IOM Press, 2002).
11. United Nations Children’s Fund, Trafficking in Human Beings in Southern Europe.
12. Donna Hughes, ‘The Role of Marriage Agencies in Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking of
Women from the Former Soviet Union’, International Review of Victimology 11 (2004): 49–71.
Global Crime 317
illegitimate companies offering catalogues and pictures of women. Women are attracted
by successful life stories of women who find a foreign husband through these agencies.
Women are registered and wait for the agency to find a potential spouse for them. Recruit-
ers find women from these catalogues, pose as prospective husbands, and encourage them
to marry them. Because women are not aware of potential risks they may come across in a
foreign country, they are easily victimised.13
Kidnapping is also used as a means of recruiting women.14 Specialised, medium-scale
organisations often kidnap women from their homelands and bring them to their own
nightclubs, bars, or illegal brothels to work by force, or tourists can be kidnapped and
compelled to work for illegal purposes.
Transportation methods of traffickers

Migrants mainly rely on facilitators to get them to their destination because they have
inadequate information about the routes and countries they have to pass through.15 It is
especially true for a potential trafficking victim who lives in a small village, has no idea
about how to obtain a passport, and has no means to buy a ticket to go abroad. These par-
ticular services are provided many times by the recruiters and traffickers. A study on child
trafficking clarifies that most of the travels are organised by acquaintances and friends.16
After successful recruitment, the victims are conveyed to the destination country
directly or through transit countries by various means of transportation. Trafficking may
occur within or across the borders; therefore, methods vary.17 One country may be desira-
ble for transit passage purposes owning to its flexibility in border control mechanisms,
whereas another one would be avoided due to its harsher penalties for traffickers and
prompt deportation of foreigners with invalid documents.18 Some girls find themselves in
countries different from the places they were promised to go.19
‘In locations where borders are porous or stretch across inhospitable or isolated terri-
tory, smugglers may offer safe passage across established or known routes’.20 In this case,
victims are usually provided with legal documents and tickets and are accompanied by the
recruiter or welcomed by a middleman at the destination. Air or sea travel is a common
13. Ibid.
Sexual Exploitation in Croatia; Kelly and Regan, Stopping Traffic.
15. Sheldon Zhang, Ko-lin Chin, and Jody Miller, ‘Women’s Participation in Chinese Transnational
Human Smuggling: A Gendered Market Perspective’, Criminology 45, no. 3 (2007): 699–733.
Children for Labour and Sexual Exploitation in Moldova.
17. Anne Gallagher, ‘The Role of National Institutions in Advancing the Human Rights of Women –
A Case Study on Trafficking in The Asia Pacific Region’ (paper presented at the Fourth Annual
Meeting of the Asia Pacific Forum of Human Rights Institutions, Philippines, September 6–8,
1999); and Brian Iselin and Melanie Adams, Distinguishing between Human Trafficking and People
Smuggling (Bangkok: Official Report for UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Regional Centre for East
Asia and the Pacific, April 2003).
18. Peter Andreas, ‘The Transformation of Migrant Smuggling across the US–Mexican Border’, in
Global Human Smuggling: Comparative Perspectives, ed. David Kyle and Rey Koslowski, (Balti-
more: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001), 107–26; and International Programme on the Elimi-
nation of Child Labour, Rapid Assessment of Trafficking in Children for Labour and Sexual
Exploitation in Moldova.
Children for Labour and Sexual Exploitation in Ukraine.
20. Newman, The Exploitation of Trafficked Women.
318 O.O. Demir
means of transportation. Most of their travel expenses, which are covered by their recruit-
ers, are then paid back to the trafficker as part of their debts. Air, sea, bus, or train travels
are common means of transportation. If the border measures are strict, traffickers may
help smuggle people into a country in trucks, trains, or by providing them with false or
forged travel documents. Corruption is also a common way of passing through the borders
when legal options are impossible or risky to try.21
Exploitation methods of traffickers

Forced prostitution and forced labour are two major types of exploitation in human traf-
ficking. Women are usually forced to work as sex workers, waitresses, childcare workers,
cleaners, night nurses, farm workers, or factory workers.
Debt bondage is one of the most common coercion methods used by the traffickers.
Deceived by false job promises, victims are brought to a country where they will be sold.
Frequently, a person known as a middleman buys women and then sells the victims to a
trafficker. After these deals have been made, the trafficker forces the women to have sex
with customers until they earn enough money to pay back the amount of debt the trafficker
incurred purchasing them. This method is referred to as ‘debt bondage’.22
In many cases, traffickers are not satisfied with the amount of money that victims earn
and so victims are forced to have sex more frequently.23 In addition, even when the debt is
fully paid off, the women are not allowed to leave or go back to their homelands; they are
simply transferred to softer, easier living conditions.24 Moreover, women who are able to
repay their debts are sometimes sold to another trafficker or brothel, and then a new debt is
accumulated. Many traffickers do not give any funds to their victims and return only a
small portion of their earnings and include the victims’ living expenses as part of their
debts.25
Confinement and threats of violence are among other types of coercion employed by
traffickers. Traffickers use a variety of tactics to intimidate and control their victims: ver-
bal threats, displays of violence, threats of police, threats of deportation, threats to harm
the victim’s family, sexual abuse, rape, and locking them up in houses or hotel rooms with
no food. In addition, traffickers offer girls to take drugs, alcohol, or smoke by which they
become addicted and eventually depended to the trafficker.26
If victims enter the destination country by legal means, traffickers confiscate the
victim’s legal travel documents after arrival. Because the victims, in most cases, do not
know the language of the destination country, they can seldom find ways to apply to any
authority.27
Children for Labour and Sexual Exploitation in Albania.
Sexual Exploitation in Croatia.
23. Tiefenbrun, ‘Sex Sells but Drugs Don’t Talk, Trafficking of Women Sex Workers’, Thomas Jef-
ferson Law Review 23, no. 199 (2001): 201–2.
24. Laura María Agustín, ‘Migrants in the Mistress’s House: Other Voices in the “Trafficking”
Debate’, Social Politics 12, no. 1 (2005): 96–117.
25. Kelly and Regan, Stopping Traffic, 25.
Children for Labour and Sexual Exploitation in Moldova.
27. Donna Hughes and Tatyana Denisova, Trafficking in Women in Ukraine, A Report for National
Institute of Justice, Grant Number: 2000-IJ-CX-0007, 2002.
Global Crime 319
Despite expanding studies on human trafficking, there are still unstudied areas where
human trafficking is or has potential to be a considerable problem. For example, only few
studies existed studying various aspects of human trafficking in Turkey.
Three important questions are addressed about the methods of sex trafficking. Explo-
ration of these questions will contribute to our body of knowledge about the methods of
sex trafficking in Turkey.
• First, how are victims of trafficking recruited into sex trafficking business? How are
those girls and women convinced to work for various purposes and through which
promises?
• Second, how are victims of trafficking transported? By which ways? Does anyone
assist them to enter Turkey and if so, who helps them?
• Third, how are victims of sex trafficking exploited in Turkey? What are the most
common techniques that traffickers apply to control and exploit their victims?
Method and data

This research has been designed as an exploratory case study. Because of the clandestine
nature of human trafficking business, it is hard to study such cases when the boundaries of
the phenomenon are not well known. Exploratory inquiries, therefore, are very useful in
discovering such a phenomenon like trafficking. Little is known about the operational
methods of human trafficking groups, especially for the case of Turkey.
Various sources of information have been used and both qualitative and quantitative
analyses have been performed. The data included national and international reports, offi-
cial data, reports, and media news. Moreover, two primary data have been collected:
police recorded victim interviews and formal interviews with key personnel who were
actively working on human trafficking prevention activities.
Police-recorded interview data included victim interviews collected between Janu-
ary 2004 and June 2007. Data were not publicly available and obtained from the
Department of Foreigners, Borders, and Asylum of the Turkish National Police (TNP).
The interview forms included background information and the detailed stories of the
victims, as well as details about the time, conditions, process, and traffickers involved.
The interviews were conducted by specially trained personnel of TNP. A translator
and/or a psychologist accompanied victims when required. Total number of victims
between the study period were 853, but only closed sex trafficking case files (N = 430)
were analysed.
The use of official and victim data has many limitations and previous studies have
underlined potential problems associated with such a data.28 In this case, however, there
are strong reasons that make the data more reliable. First, officials who made the inter-
views with trafficked women were all experienced officers, with particular experience
observing and comparing the behaviours of foreign women. Second, human trafficking
and victim identification are among the specialisations of those officers. Third, officer
reports were also validated by witness statements, by confessions of traffickers, by evid-
ence that were collected in the crime scene, and by statements of other sex workers
28. See, for example, Elizabeth Kelly, Journeys of Jeopardy: A Review of Research on Trafficking in
Women and Children in Europe (IOM Migration Research Series Rep. No. 11) (Geneva: Interna-
tional Organization for Migration, 2002).
320 O.O. Demir
Table 1. Nationalities of victims, frequency, and percentage.

Nationality Frequency %
Moldova 111 25.8
Ukraine 93 21.6
Russian Federal 67 15.6
Kyrgyz Republic 36 8.4
Uzbekistan 29 6.7
Azerbaijan 28 6.5
Georgia 18 4.2
Romania 17 4
Turkmenistan 16 3.7
Kazakhstan 5 1.2
Bulgaria 4 0.9
Belarus 3 0.7
Armenia 2 0.5
Turkey 1 0.2
Total 430 100
detected in the same place or incident. Finally, this study did not rely only on victim data;
instead, sources were triangulated, as suggested in previous studies.29
Formal interviews were semi-structured and conducted with key personnel who were
actively working in combating human trafficking activities in Turkey. The cities of Ankara
and Istanbul were chosen as interview sites and a total of 18 interviews were made by judicial
personnel, police officials, and NGO and international organisation representatives. These
people were selected as they were all well-experienced personnel from different fields such
as prosecution, security, protection, rehabilitation, international return activities, and health.
Both qualitative and quantitative analyses were performed, using content analysis, cat-
egorisation, and so on, from the victim interview forms, a variable list was formulated.
These variables were coded and transformed into quantitative data, which were then
recorded in an SPSS file and subjected to descriptive and sometimes bivariate analyses.
The findings
The victim sample included 430 victims representing 14 different nationalities. Moldovan
victims contained slightly more than one-fourth of all victims (25.8%), followed by
Ukrainian (21.6%), Russian (15.6%), Kyrgyz (8.4%), and Uzbek victims (6.7%). There
were also victims from Georgia, Romania, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Bulgaria, Belarus,
Armenia, and Turkey (Table 1).
The methods of trafficking will be examined in three major divisions; recruitment,
transportation, and exploitation.
Recruitment methods
The first step in recruiting girls and women starts with finding good candidates. As
explained above, recruiters were usually casual acquaintances of the victims or if
unknown to the victims, they were at least female compatriots of the victims.
29. See, for example, Julie Cwikel and Elizabeth Hoban, ‘Contentious Issues in Research on Traf-
ficked Women Working in the Sex Industry: Study Design, Ethics, and Methodology’, Journal of
Sex Research 42, no. 4 (2005): 310.
Global Crime 321
Victims were asked about how they were approached and what they were promised by
the recruiters. The majority of victims were assured of some kind of job (73%), 13% were
kidnapped in/into Turkey, 7% of the victims were offered a vacation, 4% of the victims
were guaranteed marriage, whereas 3% of the victims were coerced through threats to go
with the recruiters. Finally, one victim was falsely told that her lost family would be found
in Turkey (Table 2).
Victims were attracted by various offers for jobs, marriage, or vacations when
they were in their homelands. As a police official asserted: ‘They tell lies that victims
want to hear’. Another police official from the Istanbul Police Department talked
about the recruitment stage:
First of all, they set up a dream world for the girls. For example, a recruiter says “I will
arrange a salesperson position in a leather store in Turkey”, but the girl says “I don’t have
money to go to Turkey” then the recruiter encourages her by saying that he/she will cover the
expenses. They have prepared responses for any of the victims’ [concerns].
Some victims were smuggled, abducted, or lured by false promises or by force while
they were already in Turkey for other purposes such as employment or tourist activities.
The majority of victims were recruited in their homelands (72%), whereas the remaining
victims (28%) were recruited in Turkey.
A false job promise was the major method used to convince women and girls to
leave their countries for Turkey, because women have limited options to participate in
the labour market when compared to men. The recruiters usually came up with a fantas-
tic job possibility abroad. The kinds of jobs offered varied from a variety of domestic
jobs to jobs in the entertainment sector. There were also a few job offers in the profes-
sional sector.
A Russian victim described how she was duped by a fake employment opportunity:
One day, I was reading a newspaper. I saw a small ad offering good jobs in Turkey. I called
the number and made an appointment. I went to the address that was given in the phone call. I
went into the office. The lady in the office told me there was a dancer position in Istanbul,
Turkey, and I would make $3000 per month. She also offered to cover my passport and travel
expenses to Turkey. I accepted her offer.
A Kyrgyz victim told her story of being deceived by a false job promise:
My childhood friend from Kyrgyzstan told me that there were good job opportunities for
translators in Turkey, and if I would go with her, we would make tons of money together. It
was an attractive offer for me, because I knew different languages at the translator level. She
completed all my passport and ticket procedures for me. I did not talk about my plans for Turkey
to my family. Then, we departed from my homeland together.
Table 2. Recruitment methods, percentages, and frequencies.

Recruitment method Frequency %
False job promise 310 72.6
Kidnapped 57 13.3
False holiday promise 31 7.3
Marriage promise 16 3.7
Threat 12 2.8
Finding lost family 1 0.2
Total 427 100
322 O.O. Demir
When the varieties of employment were examined, only two jobs appeared to be pro-
fessional sector positions (nurse and translator), whereas the others were either in the ser-
vice sector or in the entertainment sector jobs. The most commonly offered job was dancer
followed by sex worker, nanny, cleaner, waitress, salesperson, barmaid, hostess, cook,
worker, fruit collector, singer, and receptionist.
After the initial contact, many women preferred waiting for sometime to make a decision
about the offer. Nonetheless, it was noted from victim statements that a small number of the
women gave immediate responses to recruiters, especially when Turkish boyfriends made
marriage offers or close family members made offers of vacations or jobs.
One of the Romanian victims told her story of how she accepted a holiday offer:
One of my close friends in my country had a Turkish boyfriend. She had mentioned that this
guy had a motel in Antalya. He came to Romania once and I met him. He invited us to Turkey
to have a nice holiday. So, we applied for passports and one month later we had our passports.
We departed from Bucharest by bus to Turkey, and came to Istanbul and then to Antalya. Her
boyfriend met us at the bus station and took us to his house. We spent three days and visited
several places in the area. Then, one night, when my friend went out, he told me he did not
have a motel, and my friend sold me to him. Then he forced me to have sex.
Another victim from Azerbaijan told how her family was convinced by a female
recruiter:
I was living with my family in our village. A woman we did not know before came to our vil-
lage one day and talked to my mom about me. She said, “I have a restaurant in Turkey and I
need girls for waitresses. Give me your daughter and she can make money. She can send
money to you.” Then, my mom asked my opinion and I accepted. That woman also told me to
find other friends who were willing to go to Turkey. I called a good friend of mine, and asked
her. I was afraid of going to an unknown place alone. She accepted. Then we departed from
our village with that woman.
Family conflicts were observed to be one of the most frequent reasons why victims left
their countries. Recruiters were easily able to convince women in such conditions to leave.
A woman from Kyrgyzstan detailed how family conditions affected her decision-making:
I graduated from [X] University as an economist; however, I could not find a job in this sector
in my country. After my graduation, I escaped from my family to marry my husband. How-
ever, one month later, due to several reasons such as my husband did not hold a marriage cer-
emony, and our families were in conflict, we had to separate. Then I had to return to my
family. My return then also caused several conflicts within the family. I was emotionally
upset. At that time, I met a Kyrgyz woman and told her my story. She wanted to help me and
promised to go with me to Moscow and find good jobs.
Often, the victims were short of money and had limited means to obtain a passport
and/or to buy a travel ticket abroad. Therefore, recruiter job offers were usually followed
by another promise of a free travel ticket and assistance in obtaining passport. This was
very helpful in persuading the women to leave their countries. Many victims decided to
accept the recruiter’s proposal after the offer of extra help. Victim interviews showed that
61% received recruiter assistance in obtaining travel tickets or documents. Those who
accepted assistance were probably less-experienced women or younger girls.
After girls/women were convinced, the recruiters asked the victims to gather their IDs
and other necessary documents to complete official travel procedures. This typically did
not take too long and recruiters tried to shorten this process by frequently visiting the
Global Crime 323
victim and (if necessary) her family, as well as by working with corrupt officials to obtain
passports faster.
A young Azeri victim explained how she was assisted by a female recruiter:
I did not continue my education after primary school. I worked as a dancer in a small town in
my country. One day, I met a Turkish woman. She encouraged me to work in Turkey as a
dancer and said I would make triple the money. However, I was sixteen years old, and I did
not have a passport yet. She told me that it was easy. Two pictures would be enough. The next
day, she came with a fake passport; my picture was on it with a different name and an older
age. She covered my expenses and we came to Turkey.
The recruitment methods of victims also included some kidnapping and smuggling
cases occurring in Turkey. As explained earlier, 13% of the victims were recruited by
strangers in Turkey while they were working or on vacation. It appeared that most kidnap-
ping cases took place near an entertainment facility where the victims were entertaining,
working, or passing by. In some situations, the victims were kidnapped within their first
minutes/hours in Turkey. There were also cases in which one trafficker kidnapped a
woman who belonged to another trafficker. One of the interviewed officials explained
how that happened.
A girl is brought from abroad and works in the sex business for her pimp. He publicizes his
girl if she is very beautiful and attractive, charging, for example $300 for a night. Then the
other pimps learn of it. In such a case, or especially if there is a conflict between pimps,
another pimp kidnaps that valuable girl.
After the woman was recruited, then the next step started and the victim was trans-
ported to the place where she would be exploited.
Transportation methods
With arrangements made for documentation, transportation for victims would be organ-
ised; women get sent to destination countries by various means and under the auspices of
various people at various times. In the case of Turkey, three means of transportation and
accompaniment formulas were used.
In some cases, the victim was transported from her home country alone by air, and
someone at a Turkish airport met her. Usually, when victims were sent, a description (e.g.
name, clothes, flight number, arrival airport, and appearance) was given to a person
involved with the trafficker who would meet them.
In other cases, victims were accompanied by the recruiter until they met with the traf-
ficker in Turkey. In these cases, the recruiters tended to take one or more women to the
destination country until they handed the women over to the traffickers with whom pre-
agreements were made.
A third way of transferring was that women were brought to Turkey by a recruiter, and
then they settled in a hotel for some time. During that period, the recruiters tried to contact
known traffickers to market their victims. When an agreement was made, the pimps met
the women, and if they approved them, based on certain characteristics (i.e. physical
appearance, age, price), then the victims were sold to the traffickers.
In 53% of all cases, recruiters accompanied victims on their journey to Turkey,
whereas women were sent alone in 47% of cases. Most of the victims (59%) were met by
someone at the Turkish borders crossing points (airport, seaport, or land borders), whereas
324 O.O. Demir
Table 3. Facilitators during victim transportation and percentages.

Facilitation Yes (%) No (%)
Victim accompanied by recruiter? 53 47
Victim met by someone in Turkey? 59 41
Table 4. Entry points and types.

%
Entry type
Legal 96
Illegal 4
Entry points
Air 66
Land 23
Sea 11
the remaining 41% were not met by anyone at the border (Table 3). Traffickers make sure
that women are always under their control.
Recruiters preferred to send as many women together as possible to Turkey to maxim-
ise their profit. When analysing the travel groupings of the victims, it was determined that
249 victims (58%) travelled alone (with or without a recruiter), 114 victims (27%) trav-
elled together with another woman, 37 victims (9%) travelled in a trio, 13 victims (3%)
travelled in a group of four people, 8 victims (2%) travelled in a five-person unit, and the
remaining 9 victims (2%) travelled with 9 others on their journey to Turkey. This informa-
tion was obtained from the victims, but no further data were available regarding the fate of
the other women; it was unknown if they became trafficking victims or not.
When transportation methods were examined, it was found that the majority of victims
were transported or travelled by plane (64%), 20% travelled by bus, 10% travelled by
ship, 5% of them arrived via transfers and multiple means, and the remaining 1% travelled
by train to enter Turkey.
Using a variety of different transportation forms, the victims entered Turkey at various
border-crossing points. Because the Turkish government pursues a soft visa regime
towards the countries where most victims of trafficking came from,30 the majority of the
women arrived in Turkey legally at authorised border-crossing points. In this respect, 96%
of victims reported that they entered Turkey through border gates with their legal travel
documents, whereas only 4% of victims entered Turkey by illegal means such as using
false passports and illegal crossings at land borders. Of those legal entries, 66% occurred
at air border gates, 23% occurred at land border gates, and the remaining 11% occurred at
sea border-crossing points (Table 4).
Official reports indicated that victims usually arrived in Turkey from specific border
gates: Istanbul Air (Ataturk Airport) and Sea Borders (Karakoy Sea Port), Antalya Air
Border (Antalya Airport), Trabzon Air and Sea border, Artvin Land Border (Sarp Bor-
der Gate), Igdir Land Border (Dilucu Border Gate), and Edirne Land Border (Kapikule
Border Gate).
30. Turkish Government has reciprocal visa free regime agreements (for various durations) with
countries of Moldova, Ukraine, Russian Federation, Georgia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmeni-
stan, Tajikistan, Belarus, and Azerbaijan.
Global Crime 325
Istanbul, Antalya, and Trabzon were found to be the most preferred first destination
points. The popularity of Istanbul as a gateway has various explanations such as having
the biggest air gateway not only for Turkey and for the region, having the largest city in
terms of the urban population (foreign and native), the economy (job opportunities), but
also for the entertainment industry in Turkey.
The city of Antalya is the second gateway to Turkey. Antalya has one of the biggest
airports in Turkey and receives millions of foreign visitors every year. Because of its his-
torical and natural attractions, Antalya is one of the most visited cities in Turkey and has
the third largest foreign resident population. The sex industry is also well developed in this
city, especially during spring and summer months, when there are many tourists.
The third biggest gateway is Trabzon, which is located in the eastern Black Sea region
and is one of the closest entry points to many ex-USSR countries such as Georgia, Azerba-
ijan, Armenia, Russia, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. It has a large seaport as well as an
international airport. Trabzon is also well known for its sex industry.
After the victims were transferred to their first destination city, then they either stayed
in that city or were transferred to one or more cities, immediately or after sometime, to be
sold or marketed. These transfers were usually made using domestic flights, domestic bus
services, or private cars. It is difficult to track which transit cities victims were stopped in;
however, it could be possible to learn the accurate information about the final destination
point, where the women were finally sold and marketed.
Antalya was found to be the most attractive destination for selling and marketing traf-
ficking victims, followed by Istanbul, Trabzon, Izmir, Mersin, Aydin, Ankara, and Bursa.
These attractive spots are located primarily in the western or southern parts of Turkey. Only
Ankara, the capital, is located in the middle of the country. Human trafficking networks are
more available and opportunities are higher in these cities; as well, the sex industry demands
more girls in these areas. The other destination points such as Kars, Igdir, Erzurum, and
Ardahan were located on the eastern portion of Turkey. Even though the density is higher in
southern and western cities, the destination points were spread all over the country.
How victims continued staying in Turkey?

As underlined above, 96% of victims entered Turkey legally. After their arrival, they
were transported and delivered to the places where they would be exploited. Even
though they had legal immigrant status (e.g. visa, passport, and resident status) in the
first phases of trafficking, most victims could not leave Turkey to return to their coun-
tries in the legal time period. As a result, most victims became overstayers. In their
statements, 67% of victims reported overstayer status (i.e. with expired visas), whereas
3% reported illegal status (i.e. entered Turkey illegally). The remaining 30% of the vic-
tims reported that they were legally staying in Turkey (i.e. visas not expired, not in
illegal status) (Table 5).
The variations in status may have resulted from different trafficker policies. One was
obvious for the overstayers: after the victims were brought to Turkey, their visas expired after
the requisite time, based on their visa period (e.g. 15 days, 30 days, 2 months). Traffickers
continued to force the women to work for them, not letting the victims extend their visas.
Two explanations might be possible for the victims with legal documentation: their
visas had not expired yet, or their visas had been extended. An examination of victim
statements revealed that 59 (18%) victims somehow extended their visa status. Among
them, 51 (87%) victims were assisted by their traffickers. Further inspection showed that in
these cases, visas were extended at different border gates or in the victims’ home country.
326 O.O. Demir
Table 5. Status in Turkey.

%
Status in Turkey
Legal 30
Illegal 3
Overstayer 67
Visa extended
Yes 18
No 82
Assisted in visa extension
Yes 87
No 13
Although those victims who renewed their visas at the border gates were not large in
quantity, one can argue why those victims did not try to escape or at least asked help from
police officers at the border gate when they got there. The findings of this study showed
that 46% of victims have tried to escape at least once, and among them 86% have been
successful. Among those who escaped were victims who were on the way to renew their
visas. However, many victims did not try to escape because of threats and beatings. More-
over, some victims stated that they did not escape because they believed, one day, they
would be free and make money on their own.
A new tactic followed by traffickers was to make the investment to extend their victims’
visa status by sending them to a border gate, having them crossover into another country, and
make them immediately come back to Turkey to renew her visa. This procedure, although
difficult to manage, allowed the traffickers to maintain legal immigrant status of their victims.
Then, if proper documentation was needed for hotel registry or if any police control was con-
ducted, deportation would not result; legal victims caused less trouble for traffickers. Forged
documents were also a favourite method of appearing to have legal status.
Exploitation methods
After victims are safely brought from their origin countries via several transportation
means and methods and handed over or sold to traffickers, the exploitation stage starts. A
typical scenario, an official said, was that
after a victim is brought to Turkey, first, she is usually taken to an apartment or a hotel room.
If she comes across other girls in the same place looking like sex workers, it creates doubt in
the new girl. After 2–3 hours, she recognizes the reality. Traffickers or associates then explain
to her the situation. Traffickers usually say they could not find a job as promised, but they
would arrange sex work.
In this part, victims’ experiences as well as officials’ observations are presented in

terms of how victims were forced to have sex and what kind of methods were used to
control girls.
Debt bondage
Regardless of whether financial assistance was provided by recruiters, victims were sold to
the traffickers for a specific amount of money. This money is called ‘debt’. When victims
Global Crime 327
are transported to the destination country and start working, victims are forced to pay this
debt back to the traffickers. If victims are supplied with travel tickets and passport
expenses, debts are further accumulated. Victims, regardless of whether they paid the
debt, may then be sold to another trafficker by the original trafficker. In this case, the vic-
tim is forced to pay the money that the second trafficker paid for her. This is a common
method used in trafficking cases in Turkey.
Usually victims were promised that if they paid their debt back they would be set free.
A Russian victim told her story:
A woman brought me from my home country to Turkey. We came to her friend’s house in
Antalya and spent a night there. When I woke up in the morning she was missing. The owner
of the house told me she sold me and left Antalya. He told me I would work for him and have
sex with men. I did not accept this in the beginning. But since he threatened me, I had to
accept it. He told me I would work for him for two months and pay back the debt. After two
months, he told me my debt was fully paid and I was free, and then I left his house.
Many of them, therefore, seemed to obey the rules and waited until they made the
necessary amount of money. However, in most cases, traffickers did not free them and
instead continued exploiting them. Some victims, on the other hand, did not want to accept
this obligation and refused the traffickers’ conditions. In those cases, traffickers employed
several methods to coerce them, including violence and threats, which will be examined in
the upcoming section.
The majority of victims (65%) reported that they were bonded to a debt, whereas the
remaining 148 victims (35%) did not report any kind of debt. Debts were usually calcu-
lated by traffickers in US dollars. Among those assessed a debt, various amounts were
reported, ranging from US$300 to US$10,000. The average amount of debt was US$2,685
(Table 6).
Was there any pattern with debt bondage? Why did some victims pay lower amounts
such as $300 or $500, whereas others were forced to pay higher amounts such as $8,000 or
$10,000? It was noted from victim interviews that some recruiters sold victims at a pre-
scribed market value in a specific city/area. Sometimes, a victim was sold by her trafficker
to another. This occurred especially when a trafficker wanted, for a variety of reasons, to
get rid of the woman; for example, if the victim was not cooperative, when legal visa
period expired, or when the victim was not considered young or beautiful. In those cases,
traffickers usually asked for lower amounts.
In many cases, recruiters or middlemen appraised the women, considering their phys-
ical attributes, age, marital status (virgin, single, married), and the more desirable they
were, the more money they asked for. The women’s prior experiences in Turkey may have
also been taken into account, because first-time visitors know nothing about Turkey, and
they may be more easily deceived than more experienced women.
Table 6. Debt bondage.

Debt bondage
Victim bonded a debt? (N = 430)
Yes (%) 65
No (%) 35
Amount of debt (N = 275)
Minimum (US$) 300
Maximum (US$) 10,000
Mean (US$) 2,685
328 O.O. Demir
Table 7. Correlation between victim age, number of times in Turkey, marital status, and the
amount of bonded debt.
Number of times Marital status Amount
Age in Turkey (ever/never married) of debt
Age 1
Number of times in Turkey .374* 1
Marital status (ever/never married) −.583* −.289* 1
Amount of debt −.369* −.164* .217* 1
Note: *p < .001.
To learn whether there was any relationship between victim age, number of times vic-
tims had been in Turkey, marital status, and amount of debt, a Pearson correlation was
applied (Table 7). The results indicated that there was a significant negative relation
between age and debt amount (r = −.37, p < .001). When the victim age increased, the
debt decreased. That is, younger victims were more likely to be sold for larger amounts of
money. A significant relationship between marital status (ever or never married) and
amount of debt (r = .22, p < .001) was also found. Single victims were more likely to be
sold at higher amounts. In addition, a significant negative relationship between the
number of times a victim had been in Turkey and amount of debt (r = −.16, p < .001) was
revealed. Victims were less likely to be sold in higher amounts as the number of prior vis-
its to Turkey increased.
Forced sex
Traffickers used various methods such as violence, confiscation of travel documents, use
of a weapon, threats to report them to the police, threats of deportation, threats of shame
through their families, and confinement to intimidate and control victims to be able to
force them to have sex and make money through forced sex work. Before detailing these
methods, it is essential to understand the dynamic of sex work and forced sex.
Every year millions of people visit Turkey. Visitors from the former Soviet Union
countries comprise almost 5% of all. Among these visitors, many of them stay as law-
abiding; however, a small portion works in illegal jobs. In Turkey, prostitution is among
these illegal jobs for foreigners. The statistics of foreign nationals deported for performing
prostitution underline the fact that these offences are the most common among ex-USSR
country citizens. For example, people from the Soviet countries account for 96% of all
deportations31 for prostitution between 2000 and 2006.32 In other words, sex work is a
popular (illegal) job for FSU nationals in Turkey, and therefore, they come to Turkey vol-
untarily and without any force. Moreover, one-third of all trafficked victims in Turkey
claimed that they intentionally came to Turkey for sex work. If so, could they be named as
sex trafficking victims if they came voluntarily?
In addition, when victim were asked about their experiences with traffickers, the
majority of victims (88%) were compelled to have sex, though a few of them (12%) were
31. The number of all deportation for working in the sex industry between the years of 2000 and
2006 is 17,679.
32. These figures are obtained from the Department for Foreigners, Borders, and Asylum of Turkish
National Police.
Global Crime 329
not. So, how is it that the 12% of victims not forced to have sex were nevertheless catego-
rised as victims?
Victim interviews referred to the fact that even though there were some difficulties in
sex work, they believed, one day, they would be freed and work on their own, so they con-
tinued working for traffickers. In addition, some victims consented to work for a limited
amount of money, under bad conditions, with most of the money taken by traffickers,
which is an example of exploitation. Other methods may be enough to intimidate girls,
and therefore, victims may seem to have sex voluntarily to avoid being punished in other
ways.
Ironically, after being forced to have sex for a certain duration, when some of victims
were set free, escape, or find a way to leave, they tend to start sex work in another place.
There may be several explanations for turning back to sex work. One reason, despite their
negative experience at being coerced into prostitution, might be that some victims found
sex work to be inevitably the best way of making money. Another reason could be that
those women might think they had enough experience in the underground market and
learned how to make money in sex work. A third explanation could be they had no other
choice in their homelands other than trying their chances in abroad. In any case it is obvi-
ous that their earnings in sex work would be much higher than they can make in their
countries. A woman, rescued by one of her customers, told her story of how she started
sex work on her own after being rescued:
The guy who rescued me had advised me to go back to my country. However, I decided to
work sometime in the sex business and make money and go back to my country. Then I called
a friend and started to have sex again for a female pimp and shared the money with that
woman. I really made good money. So, I gave up going back to my country.
One of the interviewed officials discussed a controversial issue: ‘I can divide victims
into two groups: Women who intended to come to Turkey for sex work and those with
other work purposes. For sex workers, when they work for a pimp, and don’t get any
money (or good enough money) they blame their pimps. If traffickers had given the
agreed amount of money to the victims, there would be no problem, even no victims’.
Violence and coercion

Most traffickers (64%) used violence as a means to control the victims, though more than a
third (36%) of them never resorted to that. Beating was the most frequent method of viol-
ence. The use of a weapon was also rare among traffickers. Only 21% of traffickers threat-
ened the victim with any weapon (e.g. knife, handgun, bat, or switchblade). In the interviews
(officials and victims), no one mentioned the use of machine guns or similar heavy guns by
traffickers. More interestingly, none of interviewees reported any experience in which a
handgun was actually fired. In rare cases, knife and bat wounds were observed (Figure 1).
These weapons were often used as a tool to threaten and intimidate victims. Violence
was usually applied when victims refused to work and/or when they attempted to escape.
Violence and forced sex sometimes resulted in unintended consequences from the traf-
fickers’ perspectives such as severe illnesses and psychological problems. In some of
these cases, they tried to get rid of the women.
Over 30% of the victims reported that they were raped by their traffickers; however,
the claim might be suspect. In fact, the victims might have said that they were assaulted,
raped, or had their earnings withheld to gain sympathy from the police. There was no
330 O.O. Demir
100
88 84 92
79
80
70 64
60
40
36
30
21
20
16
12 8
0
Forced to have Raped by Use of Presence of Confiscation Confinement
sex trafficker violence weapon of travel
documents
Yes No
Figure 1. Use of force and coercion methods, in percentages.
single indicator (e.g. a health record, rape police report) to determine the veracity of the
victim. However, rape was one of the types of coercion most often cited by the interview-
ing officers. Some officials argued that rape is a method of intimidation used when the vic-
tims refused to work for traffickers, or the victims hesitated to have sex with customers.
Confiscating travel documents was one of the most frequently employed methods
among traffickers (84%). These documents were, by force or deception, appropriated at
the initial meeting of victim and trafficker, though sometimes recruiters tricked victims
into handing over documents before they handed over victims to traffickers.
Venues
Most of the victims (92%) were confined. Victims were forced to stay in specific places
and ordered not to leave these places even in the absence of traffickers or their associates.
In many cases, victims were locked in a hotel room, apartment room, or an apartment. In
rare cases, victims were not confined and traffickers gave them limited free movement
such as the right to walk from a hotel (residence) to a café (workplace), or walk from a
hotel room (residence) to a hotel disco (workplace). Although a limited number of victims
had such rights, the women were usually kept in specific places and forced to work in the
same settings. Figure 2 shows the venues where victims were forced to work.
For a more meaningful classification, venues were organised in two categories: private
and public settings. Private settings included apartments, houses/villas, and cars, which com-
prised 47% of all cases. Public settings included hotels, motels, discos, nightclubs, bars, cafes,
and massage parlours, which accounted for 53% of all cases. When private settings were
examined, the majority of victims (43%) were locked in usually two/three bedroom apart-
ments that were in taller buildings, located either in urban or suburban areas. These were usu-
ally rental units, leased for a short time by the traffickers or their associates. The rental period
was not too long because traffickers wanted to avoid police detection. Victims were forced to
have sex in these apartments. In some cases, they were also transported by traffickers to other
places (such as hotels or customer apartments) where they would have sex with customers. As
one official commented, ‘the flexibility of women in the sex industry is much greater than that
of men and women in domestic work and other type of jobs. Because of its clandestine nature,
it is difficult to find and investigate the traffickers and victims.’
Private homes and villas were other venues mentioned (10%). These were usually two
or three storey buildings with many rooms, and luxury facilities located outside of city
Global Crime 331
Massage
parlour
Car
Club/disco
Motel
Cafe
House/villa
Hotel
Apartment
0 50 100 150 200
Figure 2. Trafficking venues.

centres, belonging to richer traffickers. However, victims were locked in specific rooms,
and they were not allowed to use other facilities during their stay except for when custom-
ers arrived. In five cases, victims were forced to have sex in private cars that belonged to
traffickers. Traffickers with limited resources usually met customers in the countryside.
Hotel (36%) and motel rooms (3%) were also used frequently for trafficking purposes.
These were usually 2–3 star hotels, located in the most densely populated areas in city
centres or in suburban areas. Some hotels had discos or nightclubs. Victims were locked in
their rooms and they were forced to have sex with customers in the customers’ rooms or in
their own rooms. Other venues, such as cafes (4.4%), discos (2.3%), and massage parlours
(.5%) were rarely used.
One victim from Bulgaria explained a system in which owners of two hotels worked
together:
There are two hotels next to each other. They work together. Their managers share the total
income as far as I know. In one of the hotels, customers come and have dinner and drink until
late hours. Hotel attendants make arrangements for girls. Then customers are taken to the
other hotel and go to the rooms in which girls wait for them. Girls are afraid of talking to the
police. Girls usually stay in both hotels. Hotel attendants continuously patrol inside the hotel,
and girls are afraid of them as well. They are registered with the reception desk. Hotel manag-
ers carefully monitor their visa status and send them to the border to extend their visas.
A Ukrainian girl described how a café was used as a meeting point:
We were staying in a hotel (with other girls). We usually waited in a near-by café where we
sat and waited for customers. When customers came, our pimp talked to them and agreed on
the price. Then, after some drinks, customers took us to a near-by hotel and we had sex with
them on an hourly or nightly basis. Pimps worked with café owners and attendants who knew
each of us very well and they always had a share in the income.
Open public entertainment facilities always have the potential for criminal activities
such as illegal drug use and prostitution as well as attracting foreign women whose visas
have expired. Therefore, these places are regularly inspected by the police. However,
332 O.O. Demir
traffickers try to avoid police raids. Another Azeri victim told how a nightclub owner hid
girls from police raids:
When any gendarmerie raid is possible or rumored, the club’s workers took us to a minivan
and traveled around the city all night. When there was a raid and no way of escaping from the
club, we were hidden in places in which it was difficult to find us: There was a place under
the dance stage covered with a curtain; an empty area behind the stage curtains, an empty
place behind the checkroom right next to the club entrance door, inside the kitchen cabinets,
and a place opening to the attic above the kitchen.
Many victims were forced to work in venues shared by other sex workers or trafficking
victims. Victims were asked how many other women were located and working in the same
venue; however, to what extent these sex workers were also trafficking victims was not
clearly indicated. The number of other sex workers ranged from 1 to 12. The average number
of women in the same venue was 3.6. In more than half of all cases (57%), there were three or
fewer women. One-third of all cases included 4–6 women, and 6% included 7–9 women. A
group of 10–12 sex workers (3%) was also identified as sharing the same venue.
One of the interviewed officials from Istanbul Police Department noted that because
entertainment facilities were sensitive areas in terms of the sex trade, they particularly
look for the existence of trafficked women there. He said:
We apply special investigation techniques in discos and night clubs if we come across girls
who are under age or who come to Turkey for the first time because there may be trafficked
victims among them. We know that they are the most vulnerable population for trafficking.
They can’t defend themselves, because they know almost nothing about Turkey.
Threats
It is apparent that most victims were locked in a place; however, some victims were free to
move around their venues, and still were evaluated as victims of trafficking. Why did not
these victims escape, go to the police, or ask for help? According to victim interviews,
many victims were coerced or frightened in the beginning of the trafficking process by
threats of deportation, police, shame/public humiliation (e.g. from her parents, her hus-
band, her neighbourhood, and school), death, death of family members, or beatings, or no
payment. In addition, as stated before, many victims came to Turkey for the first time and
did not know the Turkish language, so they could not ask for help. The threats intimidated
and demoralised them enough so that they would not leave their accommodations. One
police officer summarised ‘There are various ways of controlling victims. Confinement is
not always necessary. Threat by killing or deportation is enough to intimidate victims’.
An Azeri victim, for example, was threatened by her trafficker through her son:
When I came to Turkey last time with my son, a man that I met in Turkey fell in love with me,
and then I started to live with him. However, later, I learned that he was officially married to
a Turkish woman and I was his mistress. He registered my son as his son with the nationality
authority. Then he forced me to have sex with men. He threatened me that I would not see my
son again if I didn’t work for him. Therefore, I had to obey his rules.
A Russian girl told her story of being forced to return to Turkey after being threatened
with shame by her traffickers:
Global Crime 333
I came to Turkey on a false job promise, and then was forced to work in the sex business. I
went to customers to be with them. My visa was about to expire, so my pimp sent me to my
home country to extend my visa. I went to my country, and did not come back. I would not
return to Turkey, but she called me and threatened to tell everybody in my village that I had
done sex work in Turkey and become prostitute. It would be a shame for me and my family,
so I decided to go back.
Traffickers also threats victims with deportation, as one police official underlined:
‘Girls don’t want to be deported; rather, they want to start a whole new adventure’. In
addition, some traffickers pretended to be police officers or have police officer friends.
One police officer commented that ‘traffickers try to create an image that the police are
friends with them’.
A Moldovan girl explained her story of how she was threatened by the fear of police:
I was forced to sex work in a hotel . . . Several times, I asked the traffickers to set me free, but
every time they threatened me. There was a rumor among the girls that one of the girls was
severely beaten and tortured after she attempted to run away. This story was told by traffick-
ers to the girls when they were unwilling to go to the customers . . . The head of the traffickers
in the hotel threatened me that if I went to the police, he would bring me back and beat me,
because he was a police officer . . .33
Other tactics were also employed by traffickers to control their victims, as one police
official mentioned:
One way of keeping a woman in hand is, first, to find a loyal lover for her among traffickers,
because girls can escape any time. This guy pretends to love her and gives some little favors
such as a gift of nice clothes or a phone call to her family. If the girl escapes, she will prob-
ably call her lover. Then her “boyfriend” meets the girl and brings her back. Her escape ulti-
mately will result in a severe beating and long confinement.
Sometimes, one of the traffickers maintained a good relationship with the victim and
pretended to be a good person, whereas the others looked like bad people – similar to a good
cop/bad cop scenario. A female activist shared her observations of the rescued victims:
Some victims fell in love with traffickers or vice versa. One of the traffickers may behave bet-
ter than others to the victim. Then victim may feel better about that trafficker. They talk to
each other: “my trafficker was good, how about yours?”
Blocking communication opportunities of victims was also necessary, along with

other precautions taken by traffickers. One victim from Kyrgyzstan shared her experi-
ences in that context:
I had a cell phone, but my phone line was closed to international calls. The pimp gave me a
pre-paid phone line, but it was out of credit, therefore, I could never call anyone. It was only
used when my pimp wanted to access me.
Another way of controlling victims was drugs. Multiple interviewees shared their
experiences in which victims were addicted to drugs by traffickers. As one police official
said: ‘Some of the victims we know were forced to use drugs. Then they became addicts.
33. For this case, police records were checked and it was found that mentioned trafficker was not a
police officer.
334 O.O. Demir
As a result, victims couldn’t leave or try to escape because they were bonded to the
traffickers’.
All these methods, as one another official expressed ‘make victims feel more desper-
ate and hopeless, then victim resistance is disabled and they have to obey the rules’.
Conclusion
Various methods and tactics are found to be used in sex trafficking operations in Turkey.
To sum, most victims are recruited by persons known to them or from their communities
proposing attractive job possibilities. Some offers include free vacations or even marriage.
These offers are attractive because of unavailability of economic circumstances that per-
mit vacations, or because marriages are seen as a gateway of having a wealthy life.
Among the false job promises, victims are especially attracted by jobs in the entertainment
business because they think they can make really good money that cannot be made in their
home countries. Contrary to the findings of some previous studies,34 only one of the vic-
tims in this study was recruited through a job-finding agency, and none reported being
recruited through travel and marriage agencies. Important to the debate about choice,
coercion, and sex work, one-third of the victims were attracted by sex work.
The majority of victims enter Turkey with legal documents (using short-term tourist
visas) and with various transportation means. This shows how lenient border policies
might facilitate and provide opportunities for criminal individuals and groups. However,
hardening border controls might also result in and deaths in borders and increased illegal
entry attempts which might also cause more professional criminals to become involved in
this business in various forms, such as through passport forgery and/or human smuggling.
Therefore, eliminating the visa-free regime policy may not be likely to be a fundamental
solution in preventing the entry of potential victims.
Victims usually enter from the cities of Istanbul, Antalya, and Trabzon, which are
some of major gateways of Turkey, where transportation services directly from origin
countries are available through air, sea, or land. After their entry to Turkey, they either
stay in the same city or are transferred to another place where they are sold to traffickers.
In this respect, the cities of Antalya, Istanbul, Trabzon, and Izmir look to have the highest
number of victims.
The majority of victims continue to stay in Turkey in an illegal status after their visas
expire. Traffickers sometimes try to extend their legal status as much as possible. One of
the notable and original methods in this regard is the ‘entry–exit method’ in which traf-
fickers provide victims’ exit from Turkey and their immediate entry back into Turkey. The
victims’ visa status is extended by obtaining their visas at border-crossing points. This
illustrates the adaptability of the methods of traffickers who somehow find a way around
existing regulations and limitations.
After traffickers obtain girls, they sell them to customers in various public and private
settings. Once in the country, traffickers use various methods to control the victims, such
as debt bondage, violence, confinement, confiscation of travel documents, and threats. Not
all victims are subject to all types of methods. For example, some of them are not con-
fined, some are not beaten, and some are not threatened. Only three victims were not
34. See, for example, Hughes, ‘The Role of Marriage Agencies in Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking
of Women from the Former Soviet Union’ and Kelly and Regan, Stopping Traffic.
Global Crime 335
exposed to any of these techniques, which explain that in one way or another, traffickers
try to prevent their escapes.
Findings of this study disclosed some original trafficking methods such as providing
visa extension, finding a loyal lover for victims, and creating a good cop–bad cop environ-
ment. However, Turkish case usually includes similar practices and methods used by
human traffickers as presented in the past studies. On the contrary, as a well organised
crime type, human trafficking operators may invent new techniques that keep them away
from law enforcement interventions. Proactive measures, especially planned and intelli-
gence-led activities against human traffickers, therefore, can be tried in discovering new
methods of perpetrators of sex trafficking.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Dr. James Finckenauer, Dr. Ko-lin Chin, Dr. Leslie Kennedy, and Dr. Karima
Bennoune for their invaluable support for the completion of this study. I also thank the Migration
Research Center at KOC University (MIREKOC) for their partial support for this research.
Notes on contributor
Oguzhan Omer Demir is a researcher at the International Center on Terrorism and Transnational
Crime (UTSAM) of the Turkish National Police Academy. He holds MA and PhD degrees from
Rutgers University, Newark, NJ, USA. His current research interests include illegal migration,
human trafficking, and migrant smuggling. He is also interested in transnational crime, terrorism,
and migration nexus. He teaches courses on criminal justice, foreigners law, human smuggling, and
trafficking.

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Methods of sex trafficking: findings of a case study in Turkey

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Methods of sex trafficking: findings of

International Center for Terrorism and Transnational Crime (UTSAM),

ISSN 1744-0572 print/ISSN 1744-0580 online

boyfriends, neighbours, and relatives.4 A study on trafficked children in Moldova, for

6. International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour, Rapid Assessment of Trafficking in

Transportation methods of traffickers

Exploitation methods of traffickers

Method and data

Table 1. Nationalities of victims, frequency, and percentage.

Table 2. Recruitment methods, percentages, and frequencies.

Table 3. Facilitators during victim transportation and percentages.

Table 4. Entry points and types.

How victims continued staying in Turkey?

Table 5. Status in Turkey.

In this part, victims’ experiences as well as officials’ observations are presented in

Table 6. Debt bondage.

Violence and coercion

Figure 1. Use of force and coercion methods, in percentages.

0 50 100 150 200

Figure 2. Trafficking venues.

A Ukrainian girl described how a café was used as a meeting point:

Blocking communication opportunities of victims was also necessary, along with

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