Human trafficking in the 1980s

[alimsiemanym]

Setting: 1985 - 1989 in Miami, FL
Research done: Wikipedia (page: FBI); Google, search terms included various combinations of "1980s", "Miami", "human trafficking", "FBI", "history", "undercover

Comments

[mr_mitts]

Human trafficking's been big since forever.

Miami in the 1980s? You're looking at Cubans, Mexicans and West Africans (Sierra Leone and Liberia) as the majority groups. There was also a booming trade in East Asians (Vietnamese, Laotians and Chinese) being smuggled in via Snakeheads to East Coast cities (people are less inclined to pay attention to Asians coming the opposite direction into the country, after all).

Most of the business was cheap labor with a side order of sex trade; in Florida it'd be the sex trade for East Asians and Mexicans, work for Africans and Cubans (the latter two seem to rarely get caught up in the sexual slavery thing in the USA, the reasons for which, I'm sure, a million Masters degree dissertations have been written). The FBI wasn't expressly interested in human-trafficking at this time, though it is a federal crime; more likely INS (because it's an immigration deal), ATF (because smugglers bring in other things too) and DEA (ditto) would be onto it.

I'm not an expert, but I used to read a lot of biographies of federal agents from back in the '80s.