The Global Center on Human Trafficking
TONYA, 15 – UNITED STATES
When Tonya was 13, she met Eddie (a pseudonym) at the apartment she was living in with her mother in the Dallas, Texas, area. His estranged wife was the property manager. Tonya was classmates with Eddie’s stepdaughter, so the two would often see each other at the apartment and in the local grocery store. Things began to change one night when Tonya ran into Eddie at a bar. The two reconnected, the flirting picked up where it left off and Tonya went home with Eddie that night. Tonya was a runaway at the time, so she eventually moved in with Eddie and the two began a relationship. However, it was when the two were at a party filled with alcohol and drugs that the relationship took a turn, when Eddie asked Tonya for the first time to have sex with another man for money. What she thought would be a one-time thing became an everyday routine for the next few weeks. “Being able to sleep with that many people and live with myself and get up every day and keep doing it and just lying there being helpless was so hard,” Tonya said. (Source)