Hawaii: sunny beaches, blue ocean waters, lush green valleys. It is a land of paradise and the United State’s fiftieth state, located in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Its capital, Honolulu, is a hub for business and trading between the East and the West. Hawaii’s economy is fueled by domestic and international tourism along with a heavy military population. Tourism has been Hawaii’s largest industry since 1959, and the state has numerous installations from all branches of the United States military. All of this makes Hawaii a prime target for sex traffickers who capitalize on male travelers, businessmen, and military personnel.

As the demand for sexual services increases in Hawaii, so does the number of victims, specifically the malleable, underage victims. Young girls in Hawaii are bought and sold. They are ordered online, purchased in massage parlors and put out on the street to generate business for sex traffickers, otherwise known as “pimps.”

It has been 146 years since the Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, and yet slavery is an alive and thriving enterprise today. Selling young girls for sexual purposes generates huge profits. Unlike drugs, which are bought, consumed and easily identifiable as illegal, a young girl can be sold over and over for repeat profit. She can be forced, manipulated and coerced into appearing as an accomplice rather than a victim. Girls—United States citizens as young as twelve years old—are having their childhoods stolen; they are being stripped of their human rights, and they are sold daily into what has now appears to have been a covert criminal industry for years, right here in the Hawaiian Islands.

While it is currently not possible to know exactly how many children are being sold for sex in Hawaii, a University of Pennsylvania study on national child sexual exploitation estimated that nearly 300,000 youth in the United States alone were at risk of being sexually exploited for commercial uses.¹ This is a conservative estimate. Due to the hidden nature of the crime, the statistics do not reflect the magnitude of the domestic minor sex trafficking problem. As the general public becomes more aware of the issue, the hidden nature of this crime will be exposed.
The Justice Department’s National Incidence Study reported that 1.7 million children in the United States run away or are “thrown away” each year, with just 357,600 reported as missing to the police.²

The discrepancy in the number of children reported as runaways to the actual number of children missing is often due to non-reporting by abusive families. Approximately 300 to 400 children are reported missing every month in Hawaii. Children on the street, lacking basic human necessities, are most vulnerable and susceptible to sex traffickers. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) estimates that at least 100,000 children are caught up in the insidious world of child prostitution each year in the United States—again, a conservative estimate.³ According to International Crisis Aid statistics, between 100,000 and 300,000 children—primarily girls—are victims of the sex trade in the United States.

It is often believed that these children have “chosen” a life of exploitation. There can be nothing further from the truth. Studies show that 85 percent of victims of prostitution have suffered sexual abuse as children, often at home, which is why they have fled to the streets.⁴

Once on the streets, sex-offenders and sexual predators exploit these childrens’ desire for love, encouragement and shelter, deceiving, intimidating or forcing them into prostitution. Prostitution is not a life for a child. It is a death sentence. Unless someone intervenes, unless someone believes in these children, they will remain lost and alone.

Victims lack homes and services. In Hawaii, there is a significant lack of services providing short and long-term shelter for children. Currently there are no programs or facilities specifically for domestic child-victims of trafficking and sexual exploitation. The only walk-in service for youth in the popular sex-trafficking district of Waikiki is open just three days a week and closes at nightfall. Hawaii’s lack of resources forces vulnerable youth back out onto the streets. Instead of being helped, they are being prosecuted, thrown in juvenile detention and vilified. The pimps and johns (male customers) run free, the sex businesses flourish and children are abused and put behind bars or left out on the streets.

In the midst of these overwhelming statistics, there is hope. The answer is Courage House Hawaii—Hale O’ Mana’o i’o. In 2011, after much effort, Hawaii put state trafficking laws into place. The law provides more protection for the children exploited by sex traffickers. There is now more focus on prosecuting the perpetrators instead of criminalizing the victims. The new laws make it easier for the police and Hawaii’s justice system to send child victims to places like Courage House instead of juvenile detention centers.

Courage House Hawaii—Hale O’ Mana’o l’o—is not just a house. It will be a home for these children who have run away, who felt the streets were a better choice than the “home” they knew. God has called us at Courage to Be You (C2BU) to rescue these children from their horrific circumstances and provide them with a healthy home—a Pu’uhonua (a safe place)—where they can begin to heal from their physical, spiritual and emotional abuse. At Courage House Hawaii, a team of caring professionals will customize a trauma treatment program specific to their individual needs and long-term growth.

God created these children on purpose for a purpose™. In order for them to understand and walk in that purpose, they need a home environment where they can heal, and where they will be surrounded by a family that loves and believes in them. Courage House Hawaii can provide this for Hawaii’s children.