EW 025 – How ‘Truckers Against Trafficking’ Wins By Preventing Human Trafficking – with Heather Fry, Director at TAT

Heather Fry
Hi, Gord, thanks so much for having me.

Gordon Sheppard (00:18.786)
Well, I'm really glad that you're here because of what you're be talking about and the way that it impacts us all as an important issue, but also supports leaders in transportation and beyond in terms of all the different ways that you're gonna be telling us things about yourself and what you do. I don't mean to steal your thunder. If you had to introduce yourself and you were at an event, how would you introduce yourself to start?

Heather Fry (00:43.212)
Well, I would say my name is Heather Fry. I am the director of industry training with TAT, which is also known or previously known as truckers against trafficking. We are an international nonprofit who is raising up a mobile army of transportation professionals who are equipped to spot signs of human trafficking and effectively report what they're seeing if they do see something suspicious in the course of their everyday jobs.

Gordon Sheppard (01:14.402)
very well said in terms of laying the groundwork there. And if you had to tell people about yourself, what would you say?

Heather Fry (01:20.14)
I would say that I am passionate about fighting the crime of human trafficking. I'm passionate about people and knowing people. I've been doing this for, I've kind of had two stints with TAT. I started back before COVID and was furloughed during COVID, but I've been doing this since September of 2023 in my current position as the Director of Industry Training. And my role is to work with individuals and companies to

them determine pathways in the fight against human trafficking. So specifically I work with the trucking industry so that would include the full gamut within the supply chain. So from manufacturing to brokers, 3PLs, trucking companies, shippers, dealers. Yeah so my role is to to look for pathways that make sense within the type of organization that I'm talking to to engage in.

very simple process of fighting human trafficking.

Gordon Sheppard (02:24.215)
Well, and there's a first moment. Do you know what mean? There's a first moment when you're going to approach a company for the first time, for example. And you would have the allies that you have, but when you're developing and getting the message out, what's that first moment like? I mean, you've got someone, they may be the owner of the company, they might be somebody related, or it could be a driver, whatever that is. What's that first contact conversation like when you're just sort of letting them into the conversation? Because this is pretty important topic.

Heather Fry (02:51.114)
It is an important topic and I would say that the probably the first thing that we want to discuss discuss is the realities of the crime of human trafficking because I think there is a perception that we have. It's you know Hollywood has painted a picture of what the crime looks like and it doesn't often look like that. And so it's real important for me to make sure that people understand some of the realities of human trafficking so that they can understand why it's

that the trucking, bus and energy industries enter into combating the crime. And the answer is because they are in places where human trafficking is taking place and they 100 % can be very useful to law enforcement simply by knowing the signs. So getting educated on what to look for, taking a second look and then making a simple phone call if they think that they're seeing something suspicious.

Gordon Sheppard (03:49.624)
Well, and I've gotten lucky in my naive sort of upbringing in adulthood when I run into strong issues like this one and start to get educated about them. I remember learning a little bit about this area and in North America, if we suspect that it's not local folks that are being trafficked, we're wrong. Is that fair?

Heather Fry (04:08.238)
Yeah, we always like to say it's a homegrown problem on the victim side as well as on the perpetrator side. So I tell you every time I'm having a conversation, well, I'll say nine times out of 10, the topic of kidnapping or what is actually the crime of smuggling is brought up. So there's some confusion there, but Statistics Canada put out a report, I believe it was in 2023, and it showed that 91 % of

Victims that they talked to actually knew their trafficker. So very few people are actually kidnapped and so what we're looking for Actually isn't something that looks like somebody is going to be abducted it it often looks like two people that actually know each other and we need to be really careful in kind of just witnessing what's going on and Taking a second look if something does look a little bit

off.

Gordon Sheppard (05:10.145)
So unlimited endless education that you're doing out there in the world, which probably leads us into me asking the first question was, which is, if you had to describe your biggest win in the work that you do, what would that win be and how would you describe it?

Heather Fry (05:24.046)
So it's really easy for me to want to say, you know, give you the stats of what we're doing, but truly the big wins are the stories behind the statistics. So I'll go ahead and say that we've trained over 2.3 million individuals with our free industry specific training. But that's only significant because tied to it are real life success stories and case studies of folks in the transportation industry.

who did take a moment to make a phone call and that phone call resulted in a victim either being prevented from being exploited or being recovered from a trafficking situation. So definitely our biggest win is that our training and our model is leading to real life success stories within the transportation industry.

Gordon Sheppard (06:21.047)
I saw the startup year, it's 2009. That two million mark is remarkable in, I'm gonna say what is a relatively short period of time to reach a massive industry, but to make a dent is pretty great to hear. the, give me an example of a success story. You said someone, you can take the names out of you need to, or if you can reveal them, that's great, but give us an example of one that kind of works.

Heather Fry (06:43.692)
I'd love to share that with you. And it's one that we share often because it highlights very clearly what human trafficking, sex trafficking in particular, what it actually does look like here in Canada and the US in North America. So we talk about a truck driver who was named Kevin Kimmel or is named Kevin Kimmel. And he was on his normal route taking a break at a truck stop. He was doing paper

work and happened to notice an RV that was in the truck parking lot at the same time. And he noticed some unusual stuff happening that initially didn't seem to be a problem, but after he saw a third thing happen, he knew something was was wrong. So the first thing he saw was a man going to and from the RV to the convenience store.

in and of itself not a red flag. The second thing that he saw was multiple men coming to the RV door knocking, being let in for a short period of time and then leaving.

But it was when he saw a young woman try to stick her head out the window and have it kind of violently snatched back in and a black curtain pulled in place and some sort of commotion ensue inside that he knew that something was off and he made a phone call to law enforcement. So an officer did come to the scene and there were two people who were in, three people in the RV, the couple that invited them in, Laura Sorensen and

Derhadza invited them in said that they were on a family vacation.

Heather Fry (08:28.422)
Offered them cookies that you know something to drink and it just wasn't you know, what a typical interaction with the police officer overly friendly overly talkative The third person was a young woman who looked very disheveled You could see that she was in pretty rough condition and she took with her eyes Made eye contact with that law enforcement officer and indicated that she was not okay the

The officer took her out into the parking lot where she began crying and begged not to have to go back in with those two. What had happened 18 days prior, she was lured away from her family. These two were acquaintances of her family and she was then tortured, unspeakably tortured, beaten, raped, burned with instruments that had been heated up on the

She had a accident and and she and she

were selling her through ads on Craigslist and then men would arrive at the RV to rape her. The doctor said that had she not been brought to the hospital that she likely would have died from the infections in the state that she was in in the malnutrition within the next several days. So Kevin simply made a phone call that led to this woman

being able to get back to her family and potentially saving her life. And Laura Sorensen and El Derhadza were sentenced to prison for 40 and 41 years. So that's one the success stories that really is impactful.

Gordon Sheppard (10:37.291)
This is,

Gordon Sheppard (10:42.241)
So a couple things to unpack there. One, the call got made. That's the win for the education and those pieces that get put out there and work that you're trying to do. Two, you've told a lot of detail, maybe not even the full amount of detail, but a lot of detail that people need to hear. I can tell you honestly, it's not easy to hear that story, except that's what's happening. And I'm sure it could be sort of worse in terms of other stories that you would share as well. And this is the opportunity that your organization is creating to prevent.

to prevent this kind of human trafficking moment from happening. We've also heard about what we think human trafficking is in a Hollywood movie versus maybe the reality of it. And that idea of these people knowing often, statistically knowing, maybe being a lot of what's happening there too. So you're really opening us up to kind of the education that you're doing. I'm just gonna circle back to the win. I'm gonna ask for maybe a short kind of sentence in a sense for the win. If you could sort of boil it down and sort of, know, how you would describe the win in one or two sentences, go ahead.

Heather Fry (11:43.586)
that the transportation industry is making a difference in the fight against human trafficking.

Gordon Sheppard (11:49.25)
Perfect. So the transportation industry is making a difference in the fight against human trafficking. You folks are a big part of the messaging and getting it out there to do that. What I like to jump into now is when we know the win clearly and we've heard all the good setup for the context of what we're talking about, we always talk about the strategy, the work plan, the people, operations and results behind any win that it is. So the transportation industry is stepping up in a sense is what you're saying. What's the strategy behind getting this win? You know, if you had to talk about the vision, the values, the mission, and we're hearing some of that already, but how would you describe that?

strategy.

Heather Fry (12:19.864)
Yeah, so our mission is to educate, equip, empower, and mobilize members of key industries and agencies to combat human trafficking. And we're doing this through going after hearts and minds to engage bystander intervention. So basically we're turning passive bystanders into active disruptors because we know that if you think about a truck driver, think about the sheer number of truck drivers, probably

right around four million between the US and Canada. And then their expansive travels, they're on the roads, they're in the places where human trafficking is taking place. It's taking place in rest areas, truck stops, hotels and motels. And so if we think about the over the road driver, those are the areas that they've got access to. If we think about a local driver, they are in and about the communities and potentially delivering

items to doorsteps. And then in the mover and in-home delivery space, they're actually going into homes and have the potential to witness residential

exploitation. And so we believe that they can be a valuable asset to law enforcement. There's more of them than there are law enforcement officers out on the road. And so with each company that we work with, we look for the different intersections with human trafficking. So I mentioned the trucking industry with the bus industry. We've got school bus

bus drivers, transit and motor coach. There's bus terminals where victims are being recruited as well as exploited. Oftentimes a bus terminal is the first place that a victim will go to if they do try to attempt an exit from their trafficking. And then if we're looking at the energy industries, know, those groups of men who go on the field to

Heather Fry (14:31.824)
for several months at a time, traffickers will exploit those locations. So if we educate all of those people, give them the tools that they need to recognize something suspicious and give them the tools to know how to report a crime simply through making a phone call either to law enforcement or to the human trafficking hotline. We're equipping them to truly make a difference and to

disrupt or prevent a person from continuing to live a life of slavery.

Gordon Sheppard (15:08.481)
Wow, so the strategy is super clear. There's a lot more of these folks that are out there in the places where they are going to have the opportunity to recognize what's happening. There's that chance to educate as many of them as possible. And it literally is millions of people that are out there. so how do you, the strategy becomes then to sort of pull in that army of sorts that can be ally in preventing this human trafficking from occurring. And you're on the way to doing it. Cause I heard the 2 million plus.

educated and I'm sure you have ambitions to go into the 10 millions or whatever those things are as you kind of go forward as an organization. Remarkable. That's the strategy. Every strategy needs a work plan. So, you know, it's one thing to say, well, let's reach all the drivers. But there's highlights along the way. It's not easy getting this type of there's so many messages that different people need to take in. So what's what's the highlight from the kind of the work plan along the way that you would point out to say this is why this win occurred?

Heather Fry (16:03.628)
Yeah, so we've got three very clear goals. The first is to saturate the trucking bus and energy industry with our free materials. Our training videos are documentary style. They can be completed in less than 30 minutes. They're very engaging from a heart and from a knowledge perspective. They include survivors who talk about their lived experience. So that's the first way.

that we're working through meeting our mission. The second way is that we partner with law enforcement and government agencies to facilitate the investigation of human trafficking. So at the provincial level, we are working to implement not only law enforcement training, but we have a five element model called our Canadian Commercial Vehicle Enforcement Model. And it encourages agencies to leverage their entry points with the

the different industries to spread awareness and to activate those professionals. So we're currently working in seven provinces. You know, we're the five elements that I talked about. So we're training law enforcement. We're asking these officials to stock truck inspection stations and ports of entry. We are working to ensure that every person as they get their license, their

commercial driver's license gets one of our

wallet cards and they are equipped with the red flags of human trafficking just by having that wallet card. We're asking officials to visit bus terminals with our materials and include our information in transportation association meetings and conferences. So that's our second goal. Our third goal is to marshal the resources of our partners. So we are so thankful for all of the companies and the individuals that we work with who are

Heather Fry (18:07.344)
helping us move the needle forward. And this would include simply training their employees, implementing policies, making introductions to other key stakeholders, going public on social media about their relationship with us. And also it could include giving corporate funds. So our network of drivers and companies, those are the people who are really helping us advance the mission. We're a team of about, I think we're maybe

to 24 individuals now and this is the largest we've ever been in our organization. But we rely on individuals and leaders within companies to catch the vision to really see the need and then to also see how uniquely positioned they are to help in this heinous crime. really through engaging our leaders within companies we're able to

to make a difference and get that big reach that we've been able to get.

Gordon Sheppard (19:14.111)
I can't believe how many iterations this takes. We start out with that one idea of let's prevent human trafficking and you can hear the complexity now and you've added on staff and you've added on programming, right? You said you mentioned you've got your video and types of education that people can complete in a short amount of time. You've got your model, five pillars in your model that you've got that will, I'm gonna say expand as you learn more and you get sort of feedback from the marketplace in a sense on best ways to go forward. And finally, again, these.

I'm going to say corporate or allies or leaders and their organizations that are able to support you at higher levels in all those different ways. Isn't that this kind of a maturing organization in a sense that's kind of getting good at helping you to get the win by pulling all those things together? And I can only imagine speaking to you in 10 years when the, don't imagine this problem's going away anytime soon. do you know what I mean? And so whether that's a good thing or not that you're in business, the fact that you're doing it effectively and then this multiplier effect that you're having by

catching hearts and minds through all these efforts. That's just really wonderful to hear that the efforts are being made. And again, you've got the success stories to back up the efforts that you're making. The third piece in there is people. We always need people in a win. So if you had to describe kind of the key people and their attitudes, I'm really interested in these key senior leaders who get it, right? There's something about, you would have examples of that. we met with this senior leader from this place. What's an example of a senior leader that kind of gets it and then adapts?

what you're telling, helping them to learn.

Heather Fry (20:42.06)
Yeah, so I think our greatest asset by far is our partners. Like I said, we're a team of 24 people, so we can't scale to do this without them. And so I'll talk about UPS. UPS is one of our biggest sponsors. And the way that they've engaged is not only through

rolling out our training to all of their drivers, but also through implementing policies and being really instrumental in getting the word out and holding events, holding community events where we can spread the awareness, making introductions. You know, it really does take a key leader at an organization to be able to make a difference. So UPS is kind of a big example.

And within some of our smaller, let's talk about trucking companies, safety directors who have really caught the vision and implemented training to all of their drivers. I mean, that's really the basic ask. If we can get a company to catch the vision enough to incorporate training with their drivers, we think that that is a major win. There are other ways that folks

get involved, but this is the really key way to make a difference, getting those frontline workers equipped with the tools to spot signs of human trafficking.

Gordon Sheppard (22:18.935)
I'm so glad to hear so many leaders are buying in and how neat to hear them when they get to listen to this, that thing of like, I can go beyond just the learning tools. can hold an event. I can support with dollars. I can do all these different things again to support this really, really important issue. That's just a great example in there. Four-step is always operationally. If we're going to have a win, we've got to have some operational moments in there that move things along. The training videos were created. You've come up with your five pillars.

I'm going to say regulatory legal components that are in here too. I'm just sort of naming a few that might be involved. If you had to sort of, you know, pick out operational highlights to deliver this win, what sort of operational highlights would you like to point out?

Heather Fry (23:02.678)
I would point out a spectacular tat team.

who, you know, we work tirelessly to advance TATS efforts and we're doing an amazing job and I work with such a great group of top-notch people. So, you know, we've got the different teams, you know, those who work in the trucking industry and that includes anywhere from manufacturer all the way down the supply chain to the trucking companies that's hauling product, but everywhere in between as well, the shippers.

3PLs, brokers, dealers, and then within the bus industry we've got a great team that's really working hard to reach those frontline workers who deal directly with youth and sometimes even with parents and getting that awareness out to them not only about how they can be instrumental in making a phone call but also how they can spread the word with youth and

about some of the grooming techniques and the tactics that traffickers will use. So we recognize that those in the bus industry, school bus, transit, and motor coach really have a unique role there as well as the energy. And then we have a team that works specifically in the public sector, advancing our law enforcement training and our efforts within each province. And then we've got another team that works to bring those two

audiences together. one of the things we do is a coalition build. we engage government agencies, Crown prosecutors, RCMP, local police, alongside trucking industry, bus industry and energy industry leaders. And we begin the conversation about what does it look like to work together to combat this crime. So we're opening up those doorways for a greater

Heather Fry (25:07.088)
awareness about how each group, private and public, can work together in the fight against human trafficking.

Gordon Sheppard (25:17.111)
So this operational team of 24 punches above their weight in terms of how far they're able to spread the message. They're able to sort of segment out into specific areas for areas of development as you kind of grow the message and get it out there. Also, you are outstanding relationship managers. I can hear it. When we talk about building coalition, we talk about going, it's one thing to sort of pull a bunch of agencies together. It's another thing to get in with a company and go within the company. Some of these companies are big.

So we have to work within them. But key relationship and relationship management would be an operational highlight. I'm sure you folks are just super good at it. I'd love to see your customer relationship management system in terms of all the sophisticated ways that you're pulling that together. Again, with not like a sales end, with a real human outcome and on the positive side for where that's headed. Wow, we could talk about that one for a long, long time. It must be nice to work with that team. Finally, you know, we've talked about strategy, work plan, people, operations. The last one is results.

and qualitative and quantitative results in relation to this win. So you mentioned the 2 million train, that's a concrete thing. But if you had to mention again highlights in the qualitative and quantitative results, what would they be?

Heather Fry (26:26.156)
Yeah, so definitely metrics, you know, that's something that we we are always looking at metrics just to ensure that we are staying true to our mission and staying accountable to our partners. So we're looking at the total number of trainings that people have gone through. We're looking at how many companies have implemented anti-trafficking in persons policies. We're looking at the number of provinces and states that are involved

in our commercial vehicle motor vehicle enforcement models. like I said earlier, the stories truly are what we actually what keeps us moving forward because without that human element and some sort of feeling like we've won, it can be a bit of a heavy job. So what we've done is we've incorporated an award system. So each year we

give out our prestigious Harriet Tubman Award to a person in the transportation industry who either prevented or interrupted an active trafficking situation. And so this goes out each year and it comes with a $5,000 award. And we're taking nominations now through the end of January. so Kevin Kimmel, who I told you about earlier, he was our 2015 human HTA award

Award winner he we've been doing this since 2013 And I if we have time Gord, I'd love to tell you about our 2023 winner because

Gordon Sheppard (28:05.751)
I would just, I just need to back up for one second, because we'll get to that in just a sec. the Harriet Tubman, some people may not have their history lesson understood. Who was Harriet Tubman? Why was that the inspiration for this award? Go ahead.

Heather Fry (28:18.924)
Well, Harriet Tubman was instrumental in ending slavery and bringing slaves to safety and ultimately brought them into Canada, which was the end of the railroad. And so, you know, she never lost a passenger, she says. And so we are, you know, kind of following in the footsteps through our model. And our hope is that we can end lives of slavery.

where their existence is modern day slavery through our model. And so it's inspirational.

Gordon Sheppard (28:54.487)
That is just wonderful inspiration. just imagine the Harriet Tubman Award with that context historically, but now that you're carrying again, the sense of that mission and moving that forward, that's the name of your award. You said there's a 2023 winner. Please tell us, please.

Heather Fry (29:09.346)
Yeah, so I'd love to tell you about Joe Aguayo and he drives for Winko Foods and he was driving on a remote stretch of road which was his normal route. It is an area that is known for no cell phone service because of how desolate it is. So he was riding and noticed a woman with a shaved head wearing nothing but a beach towel standing on the side of the road. Now Winko Foods

had a very strict policy against picking up unapproved riders and he adhered to that policy and he drove to the next police call box because he did not have cell phone service. So he made a call to law enforcement, gave a description of the woman, gave a description of the area and chose to go on his way knowing that he had done all that he could do and that law enforcement would take it from there. So fast forward a few months later he was

on the same stretch of road and had a weather-related accident. the trooper who arrived, he inquired about the young woman that he had made that report on, and it just so happened that it was the same officer who had responded to that. And he was able to relay information. So that was a 27-year-old victim of sex trafficking. She had been drugged and was in extremely rough shape.

Turns out that that stretch of road had become a dumping area of sorts for indigenous women and likely because of how desolate it was and the fact that traffickers probably believed that nobody would be willing to stop, that they would be scared about what might happen or seeing her as a potential problem. But Joe Aguayo, Winko Foods had just rolled out training just weeks prior to Joe witnessing that

woman on the side of the road and so he had a perspective of that woman as a human being in need of some help and did go ahead and make that phone call. Another situation where the doctor said she was in such bad condition that she likely would have died in the next several days if somebody hadn't done anything to get her to the hospital. Somebody else had called about that woman earlier in the day but they couldn't find her earlier in the day.

Heather Fry (31:38.004)
Jo's bravery, simply through making a phone call, made all the difference and she was able to get hooked up with survivor services in the aftermath of her trafficking and go back home and receive the care that she needed. So just another example.

Gordon Sheppard (31:51.714)
That story really just brings it all together. Again, difficult to hear, except we need to hear it so that we get information to people like Joe so that he can do something about it. You're making that happen. That's sort of the win that happens here. It helps more people in the future as they hear this kind of story as well. Heather, it's important if people need to get in touch with you, what's the best way for them to do it?

Heather Fry (32:19.33)
Yeah, info at tatnonprofit.org is the email to reach us. Obviously our website is tatnonprofit.org and we have a free app. So if you go to your app store on iOS or Android, we have an app where you can see all of the red flags of human trafficking. You can read more case studies. You can find parent resources and community resources, all kinds of great and valuable information there.

Gordon Sheppard (32:49.611)
This podcast is for leaders and I know there's gonna be leaders in transportation and beyond and law enforcement that are gonna hear this and take something away from it where they can either do something directly with you or again become more aware of this important issue and again the wins that you and your team are getting to help so many more people. Heather, I really appreciate that you took the time to come on the show. Thank you so much.

Heather Fry (33:13.986)
Yes, thank you so much, Gord.