One man has been arrested and charged in connection with a human trafficking investigation in Windsor.
Around 11 a.m. on March 7, Windsor police were contacted by a police force in the Greater Toronto Area, about a social media message from a young person, saying that they were in distress and possibly in the Windsor area.
Officers eventually located a young girl an hour later in a motel parking lot in the 2300-block of Huron Church Road, and after speaking with the girl, police learned that she had recently travelled to Windsor from the GTA with an adult male.
The investigation revealed that a number of human trafficking related offences were believed to have occurred.
An adult male was located in the motel and arrested without incident.
Investigators also applied for and received judicial authorization to search the involved motel room.
According to police, the suspect and the young female met around a month ago and not long after, the male began controlling behaviour over the female and involved her in the sex industry. The adult male was believed to be controlling the victim's finances, clientele, and movements.
Sgt. Steve Betteridge says the young girl was sent to hospital for a medical assessment and was put in touch with community partners to assist with her recovery.
"This young victim is in kind of recovery, if you will, and moving forward with professionals that deal with that area of victim assistance, which is a positive," he says.
Betteridge calls human trafficking "a unique kind of crime" because it doesn't usually just happen.
"Human trafficking usually is over a period of time and involves recruitment, often transportation, and that's what we had here, and harbouring of persons. And there's usually for a purpose of exploitation, typically in the sex industry or forced labour," he says.
The suspect, from the Greater Toronto Area, is facing seven human trafficking related charges including trafficking a person by recruiting, sexual assault, publish intimate image without consent and sexual interference with a person under 16 years of age.
The suspect's name is not being released to protect the identity of the young girl.
The case remains under investigation.