© 2024 Ideastream Public Media

1375 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44115
(216) 916-6100 | (877) 399-3307

WKSU is a public media service licensed to Kent State University and operated by Ideastream Public Media.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Human Trafficking Cases Rise in Ohio

photo of Human Trafficking Task Force presentation
KAREN KASLER
/
STATEHOUSE NEWS BUREAU

There were more than 200 people identified as potential human trafficking victims in Ohio last year, nearly all of them female, and more than a quarter of them under 18. Statehouse correspondent Karen Kasler reports on the latest report from the state’s task force on human trafficking.

The number of potential victims is up slightly over last year’s report. But the state’s human trafficking coordinator, Elizabeth Ranade-Janis, says there’s a detail that explains that.

“It absolutely is the case that increased awareness yields more people being helped.”

Ranade-Janis says it’s estimated more than a thousand kids are being trafficked in Ohio at any time. There were more than 100 investigations in the last year – a third resulted in criminal convictions. 

Karen is a lifelong Ohioan who has served as news director at WCBE-FM, assignment editor/overnight anchor at WBNS-TV, and afternoon drive anchor/assignment editor in WTAM-AM in Cleveland. In addition to her daily reporting for Ohio’s public radio stations, she’s reported for NPR, the BBC, ABC Radio News and other news outlets. She hosts and produces the Statehouse News Bureau’s weekly TV show “The State of Ohio”, which airs on PBS stations statewide. She’s also a frequent guest on WOSU TV’s “Columbus on the Record”, a regular panelist on “The Sound of Ideas” on ideastream in Cleveland, appeared on the inaugural edition of “Face the State” on WBNS-TV and occasionally reports for “PBS Newshour”. She’s often called to moderate debates, including the Columbus Metropolitan Club’s Issue 3/legal marijuana debate and its pre-primary mayoral debate, and the City Club of Cleveland’s US Senate debate in 2012.