Human sex trafficking is the fastest growing business in organized crime,
and police departments across the country haven’t been able to keep up.
Many sex trafficking victims start out as runaways,
but the police don’t prioritize their cases—
because most runaways eventually come home.
And when they don’t,
there isn’t much that officers can do,
unless the child had been seen being kidnapped.
With the police on the sidelines,
very few people are left to take up the search.
But in San Diego,
which has one of the highest sex trafficking rates in the country,
a group of rogue volunteers is hunting for the missing on their own.
— You’re only about 20, 30 minutes away.
Look for my Hummer when you get in the Starbucks parking lot.
— Joseph Travers runs Saved in America,
a nonprofit network of 28 former Navy Seals and police officers
who now volunteer their time rescuing missing children at risk of sex trafficking.
Many of them have asked that we protect their identities—
they do this in addition to their day jobs.
— Rick is undercover, out in front of the house.
So as soon as you guys are set up,
if you see the girls run,
go ahead and snatch her up, we’ve got a power of attorney.
And then we’re gonna call the PD, and they have the police report.
It’s gang infested and they’ve got lookouts everywhere.
— Today, they’re helping the local police retrieve a 14-year-old girl named Lily.
— Can you see the girl outside?
— When Lily went missing,
she was initially classified as a runaway.
It’s been almost a month without any active police investigation into her absence.
— When someone comes to Saved in America,
what stage are they at?
— Mostly, the parents are in a panic stage,
and they’re waiting for something to happen.
So now the family is at a standstill.
They have to go find their child on their own,
and most people don’t know how to do that.
So we fill that gap.
— Joseph’s team uses social media, research, and undercover techniques
to find children’s whereabouts.
— So we’re talking to the informant, and she’s with him.
Why don’t we call the cops?
— As soon as they have a location,
they work with parents and police to have the child picked up.
— Can you come talk to the sergeant?
— Lily’s mother Ruth has come along for the search.
— Hi, sergeant. How’re you doing?
Joseph Travers, how are you?
This is mom, Ruth.
Her daughter’s inside, there.
The 14-year-old.
So our guys got a positive ID on her, in the front yard,
and then she went back in the house.
— We are not going to be able to force entry on a runaway juvenile, just telling you that right now.
— Even one who’s… trafficked?
— Unfortunately, there’s allegations of trafficking,
but has there been crime cases taken?
Has she come forward as a victim?
If that hasn’t happened yet—
and even if there was,
that still isn’t to a position where we’re gonna be allowed to kick a door down
and go look for somebody that’s not…
of course that’s not within the law.
We cannot do that.
— The police say they don’t have enough probable cause to enter the home by force.
Once they surround the house,
a Saved in America volunteer spots Lily in the backyard
and was able to reunite her with her mom.
Lily asked that we conceal her identity.
— Man, you guys, good job.
— On January 30th,
Ruth woke up to find Lily was missing.
But the local police in her hometown in Utah concluded that Lily had run away,
and that there was nothing they could do,
since Lily had left on her own.
— I’m like, so, if she never runs across a cop,
then you’re telling me she’s never going to be found?
He goes, “Well, basically that’s kind-of how it is.”
— How long did it take Saved in America to find Lily?
— Two days.
— Two months after Lily was retrieved,
Ruth headed to the office of Utah Congressman Chris Stewart,
hoping that he could pressure law enforcement to treat runaway cases more seriously.
The congressman wasn’t sure where to start.
— I basically was on my own.
I said, “Why? Is my daughter not important? Why isn’t anybody listening to me?”
I’m not gonna wait around until somebody comes and offers me help,
I’m going to go out there and try to find somebody that could help me.
— Yeah.
And if there’s something we could do to stop this from happening to someone else,
we wanna do that.
Because not everyone’s gonna have a mom like you.
I can tell you’re discouraged.
I’m sorry.
— I am, because I really want things to change.
I don’t want anybody else…
— But, I mean, don’t forget you got her.
You got her back.
— I don’t just want to be greedy and say,
“I got my daughter, and that’s all that matters,” no.
I want to try to help.
— Why is it that when someone reports a runaway,
it can be a long time before people act on their case?
— Unless it’s an urgent situation,
the police unfortunately—
and I come out of that field—
there’s just…
they don’t have the resources.
So if you have a missing child or runaway,
when law enforcement looks at it,
it looks just like,
“Well, she just left because she wanted to be with her boyfriend,”
or whatever.
So it doesn’t appear to be a high-priority situation.
— Summer Stephan is San Diego County’s Chief Deputy District Attorney
and Chief of the Sex Crimes and Human Trafficking Division:
— The studies tell us that we have about 5,000 victims of sex trafficking
in San Diego County annually.
We don’t encounter that many.
We prosecute, between us and the federal government,
about a hundred cases a year.
But there are so many more victims.
— Summer could not say how much funding the sex trafficking task force receives.
The San Diego Police Department declined to participate in this story.
— Do you see a private group like Saved America as being part of the larger community of resources
that can be pooled for something like this?
Do they help or ever harm an investigation that your team is already a part of?
— They can be very helpful.
Because victims sometimes don’t trust police,
and a private investigator doesn’t have the police powers.
And so long as they abide by their ethical duties of staying in their lane,
and operating and providing information to police,
then we welcome them.
— We’re there for the parent as a resource.
I think the greatest thing that could happen is if Saved in America didn’t have to exist.