Justice Dept. hyped successes against sex trafficking

August 01, 2008
Report: Justice hyped successes against sex trafficking

Today's post is from our colleague and guest blogger Marisa Taylor, Justice and Homeland Security reporter in McClatchy's Washington bureau.

Marisa reports:

Yet another watchdog report has uncovered problems inside the Justice Department. Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine (left) already found that department lawyers under former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales weeded out liberal-leaning lawyers for career positions in violation of the law. This time, the inspector general has uncovered discrepancies within a program dedicated to cracking down on human trafficking.

During his tenure, Gonzales spent millions of dollars on combating the international trafficking of indentured servants and sex slaves, including by creating task forces across the country that identified and helped victims. Over four years, the department shelled out $50 million to the task forces and other groups. Conservative groups, who pressured the administration to go after sex trafficking more aggressively, applauded his efforts. But critics have questioned whether the problem was being hyped.

Lo and behold, Fine found in an audit released Friday that the task forces and other groups set up to help were "significantly" overstating the number of victims they served. By examining a sampling of cases, Fine found the task forces had exaggerated by as much as 165 percent. Making matters worse, the inflated numbers had been included in annual reports to Congress.

Here's a link to the report: http://www.usdoj.gov/oig/reports/OJP/a0826/final.pdf