The Fight Against Sex Trafficking: Insights from Detective Heidi Chance

Detective Heidi Chance shares her extensive experience in combating human trafficking. She discusses her journey from being a police officer to focusing on the complexities of trafficking, including the vulnerabilities of victims, the role of the internet, and the emotional toll on law enforcement. Detective Chance emphasizes the importance of community awareness, parental guidance, and recognizing signs of trafficking, while also addressing the evolution of legal support for victims. The conversation concludes with resources for parents and the community to help combat this pressing issue.

Takeaways

• Detective Heidi Chance has over 25 years of law enforcement experience.
• Traffickers exploit vulnerabilities, not just socioeconomic status.
• The internet plays a significant role in modern trafficking.
• Victims often do not see themselves as victims due to brainwashing.
• Legal support for trafficking cases has evolved positively over time.
• Recognizing signs of trafficking can help save lives.
• Parents must engage in conversations about online safety with their children.
• Technology has made it easier for traffickers to target youth.
• The emotional toll of working in trafficking is significant for law enforcement.
• Community outreach and education are crucial in combating trafficking.

How to find Detective Heidi Chance and order her book "Talk to Them"
www.achanceforawareness.com
On IG www.instagram.com/a_chance_for_awareness/

Dad to Dads Podcast on IG www.instagram.com/dadtodads/

Transcript

Robert (00:58)
Detective Heidi Chance, welcome to the podcast.

Detective Heidi Chance (01:01)
Thank you so much, I'm glad to be here.

Robert (01:03)
it's a little off topic from what I normally discuss, but, it's something that I wanted to highlight and, really bring more awareness to, and especially with what you're doing, not only combating sex trafficking, but also rescuing the victims of it as well. But first, before we go into it,

what is your background? How did you how did you get into this?

Detective Heidi Chance (01:26)
Yeah, so my background is being a police officer and I was a police officer with the City of Phoenix Police Department. I spent 23 years sworn with them, 25 years total, and then I moved on to another agency. But during my time at Phoenix Police Department, I worked as a school resource officer at about...

five years into my career because I decided to start a family. And so I was thinking, okay, new baby, second shift, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday off, working till three in the morning is probably not conducive with a new baby. So I applied for a position with school resource officer and got that position. And then I blinked and six years went by and basically I loved what I was doing there, but...

While as a school resource officer I had a kid that I ran into that kind of changed the trajectory of the rest of my career. There was a little girl that I knew when she was in seventh and eighth grade and on the day that I saw her again she was still a juvenile, 16 almost 17, and she was in custody in the juvenile holding area at the precinct.

And as I walked by, because I went in to turn the keys in, because we don't get to take the patrol car home, unfortunately, I saw her through the window and I opened the door and she recognized me and I was like, why are you in trouble? And that's when she told me she was under arrest for prostitution. And it was kind of, she was a juvenile still, she was 16, almost 17.

Robert (03:01)
And she was in what grade?

Detective Heidi Chance (03:07)
And it was one of those things that was, you know, mind-blowing to me. I mean, obviously I'd been a cop for several years. I knew about prostitution. I just didn't think kids got involved in it. And this was a while ago. We don't arrest kids any longer. But this was a situation where she was an out standing runaway and was also caught with a trafficker. And at that time, and this is what's unique to my perspective as well about this, at that time we were arresting prostitutes.

Robert (03:17)
Yeah.

Detective Heidi Chance (03:37)
Whereas now we focus more on traffickers and sex buyers and we view prostitutes as potential exploited people and really try to do a good job of getting them out of the life, getting them assistance and getting them justice.

Robert (03:53)
Wow, I love that approach to it as well. Going more for the snake's head, I guess, instead of going after the ones that are victims.

Detective Heidi Chance (04:04)
Yeah, I mean

even the setup of the two squads that I was initially working with when I decided to go over to the unit, back then it was called Vice, now it's called the Human Exploitation and Trafficking Unit, but at that time when I first tested for a position, I was competing for one allotted female position per squad. Fast forward to today, the female undercover officers actually outweigh the male detectives because

Obviously we've recognized that in order to fight trafficking and go after traffickers and sex buyers you need female undercovers. So it's really a unique way to see it all come to fruition.

Robert (04:45)
So, and you can go into it more, I was, you you, pointed me in the direction of a documentary that where you were featured on it, you and your team, you guys do a lot of this through the internet and there's a lot of, guess you, you find the, the abusers and such, sex, sex buyers on the internet. Is that a lot of what you guys do? And then you kind of stage a meeting place.

Is that correct?

Detective Heidi Chance (05:17)
Yeah, so in Phoenix, which is the fifth largest city in the United States, by the way, we have known areas for prostitution in the streets of Phoenix. They're called the Blade or the Track. But we also have lots of pockets of hotels, and we have prostitution occurring in those hotels on a regular basis. So we will conduct undercover operations to pursue both rescuing victims.

and rescuing potential juveniles that might be out there as well based on advertisements on prostitution websites as well as, on the other side of it, attack the problem of sex buyers purchasing people both out on the streets and in hotels. And where we advertise is internet prostitution websites or even social media, which is consistent with the way that it is done with actual victims of trafficking being advertised.

Robert (06:12)
Okay, so, and I do want to plug the YouTube video that you sent me. It's called what, Sex Trafficking in America? Is that it?

Detective Heidi Chance (06:21)
Yes, that's the documentary.

Robert (06:23)
Yeah. know. Was it put on by PBS or somebody or who was it? Okay. It's, fascinating. And, I wrote you after that.

Detective Heidi Chance (06:26)
huh.

Robert (06:31)
It's very eye-opening. A lot of things I wasn't aware of. I do appreciate, I do really appreciate what you guys are doing. I want to add, there's a lot of questions that came up in my head. When I think of sex trafficking, I automatically think of like with the victims, I automatically think of females. Is that like, if you were to say a percentage, is it majority females that are the victims or, or who?

Detective Heidi Chance (06:58)
Well, I can tell you that it's females and males. And it is a situation where you have females that come forward more often than males for various reasons. And we know that males are definitely being trafficked. We just don't have them coming forward as often as females. So it's not really a way to say how many is out there. In fact, when you look up on Google how bad is human trafficking, you're going to see, you know,

27 million to 37 million victims. Well, we don't know how many victims are out there because we don't know who hasn't come forward yet. The only information we can base our numbers on are the people that are documented and identified as victims. So I wouldn't put a lot of stock in what Google says or the internet says about this issue because a lot of people create posts just to do some kind of shocking thing. it isn't helping. It isn't accurate. But

If it is causing at least people to think about this problem, maybe that's the only benefit I see. But the accuracy of the numbers isn't there.

Robert (08:00)
All right. And you know, having two kids myself and a lot of people that listen have children. mean, that's it is dad to dads. What, how does, how does one get trapped in being, or, you know, get trapped and become a victim or in what do these sex, you know, these traffickers, what, what are they, what do they look for? for, for a victim, what are the, I think personally, and I've done a little bit of research, but I would love to hear more from you.

I always thought it was somebody that maybe had a drug problem and ran away from home and then they found that person. But it's much more than that, isn't it?

Detective Heidi Chance (08:39)
Yeah, so what they're looking for is opportunity and they're looking for vulnerabilities and that vulnerability could be anything. I usually describe a case where it was seven victims, was familial trafficking, meaning it was the uncle that was trafficking his 13 year old niece and 17 year old stepdaughter and there were seven victims, five adults and in that one case you have

an adult female in her 40s who was a Department of Corrections officer working at the jail who got in trouble, lost her job and became a stripper and met the trafficker at the strip club. And then unfortunately she brought her 17 year old stepdaughter into the situation. In that same case, you have a 19 year old girl and if you're familiar with Arizona, Scottsdale is like the rich area of Arizona's metropolitan area.

And she's from Scottsdale. Her mom's a nurse. She has no family history of any sexual abuse or child neglect or child abuse or anything like that. Well off family. From Scottsdale, she's up at a college in Northern Arizona. She's on Craigslist one day and she's engaging with a person that says he wants to take modeling pictures of her. And that guy introduces her to the brothel owner and her entire life was going one direction and now she's a resident of the female prison.

because of some drugs and some other things that she got caught in doing. And so her whole life changed. And it's a matter of, it isn't just the poor kids, it isn't just the kids in child welfare, it isn't just the homeless, it isn't just a certain population. It could really be anyone is my purpose for that story because that's what I need people to realize. It's someone's vulnerabilities that could be exploited by a trafficker.

Robert (10:30)
much does the internet play today? I think, cause when you're saying that, I think about attention, right? And so many people, guys and girls, but so many young people want to be influencers, right? They want to be models. They want to, I think that is such an easy trap. Is that accurate?

Detective Heidi Chance (10:32)
Yeah.

Yeah, it's especially concerning because you have YouTube telling people that based on such and such X number of followers or subscribers, you're going to start making money. And that's quite a lure for young people to have open profiles or secret profiles their parents don't know about because they see the opportunity that YouTube says so. And unfortunately, that is what's causing

the open door into people's houses, into their child's bedroom where you have strangers engaging with your kids. You do. Whether you believe it or not, you do. And parental controls are not it. That has to be a part of it, but that's not the above all, beyond all, is going to handle this situation for you. You have to take ownership and responsibility and have conversations with your kids about these things. That's the whole purpose for my book because...

I realize the potential of the internet offers for a trafficker to sit on his butt and just message hundreds of profiles a day, copying and pasting. And I know all of this because as a female undercover, I've participated in operations where we're catfishing pimps. You never know who you're talking to. And I have had several traffickers that I've engaged in a conversation with where they thought they were exploiting me. And when I do the warrant for our conversation, I see.

that the message they sent me, they copied and pasted hundreds of other profiles and they're not just local either. I'm talking to a trafficker in Orlando, Florida that I have to extradite to Arizona for charges of trying to recruit and groom me here. And they're doing it all over anywhere they can and the internet and social media and the games have offered that opportunity to them.

Robert (12:34)
And as you said, Phoenix is the fifth largest city in the US, but it's not just a big city problem, it?

Detective Heidi Chance (12:41)
No, no, and that's a discussion I had with a relative of mine who happens to be a sheriff in a small town. And he was like, wait a minute, that doesn't happen here. And I literally looked up escorts at the one hotel that's in that town. And there were girls saying that they would do out calls to that hotel. yes, and also just thinking small towns have drugs that go through their town, right?

people driving, commuting. Traffickers are very transient. They're constantly moving. So they will be passing through your small town in a vehicle or staying overnight in your hotel, and they're going to take an opportunity to make money wherever they can. And they're moving around constantly because they have two purposes. One, they don't want to get caught by the police. So that's the other part of this whole situation. It's very transient.

Once we get wind of the trafficker, they may already be gone onto the next place and we have to wait until they come back around. But we're patient, we'll wait. But the second purpose is to keep that victim isolated. Because if they hang out too long in a particular hotel and that normal person witnesses all this stuff and approaches that victim and says, hey, what can I do to help you get away from this situation? Traffickers do not want that. And so they will dip out immediately if they see that happening.

Because if they've got their victims dependent completely on them, there's no one that can help them. So, oh yeah.

Robert (14:13)
And that's what they want, right? Is to,

to brainwash their victims.

Detective Heidi Chance (14:17)
huh.

Robert (14:18)
So I know we talked about this a little bit with the first time we spoke. When you rescue those victims, would imagine in my mind, I would imagine they would come to you and open arms like you see on TV. thank you, thank you, thank you. Is that the case?

Detective Heidi Chance (14:34)
No, they pretty much hate our guts. Well, they don't see themselves as victims. So they don't even equate what I'm describing to them as happening to them as not normal or not okay. And that's part of it. And then they are very loyal to these traffickers. That brainwashing is very real. They are convinced whether they've seen it or not that this traffic or all these promises, this is the fraud.

Robert (14:37)
The victims do.

Detective Heidi Chance (15:03)
because the very definition of trafficking involves force, fraud, or coercion. They're thinking these things are going to happen. This trafficker promised to get them into beauty school or a car or take them to Europe or whatever the promise is. They're convinced that that's eventually going to happen as long as they do these things. And then their loyalty is also extended to there's a lot of times traffickers have children in common with their victims. And I've had traffickers literally call Department of Child Safety on

their victim and tell them that they were prostituting so they get their kids taken away and then promise to help them get their kids taken or get back if they stay with them. So it's completely crazy some of the things that and the levels that traffickers will go to to keep victims doing what they want them to do.

Robert (15:55)
That goes into my next question. How supportive are the courts? Are you fine in the courts?

Detective Heidi Chance (15:59)
Yeah, so that's another evolution in itself. So when I present to the community, because I have an ulterior motive in presenting to the community, I need an informed public because that public is going to be my jury. And I can't get the sentences that I've gotten like that case I was talking about with the seven victims. That case he was found guilty on 101 out of 105 counts and he was sentenced to 493.5 years in prison, which is a record for the United States.

That only happens when you have an informed public and an informed jury. I compare that case when I present to a case where I had a victim that was 14 and she was trafficked out of Arizona, which is another crime because she was across state lines trafficked. All kinds of things happened to her. Violent incidents. She has scars from beatings. And this pimp was offered a bullshit plea of only 20 years.

And that was back in 2010. Fast forward to what I'm talking about now, right before I retired from Phoenix Police Department, I got a trafficker put in, one victim, 108 years. And that is the evolution of everyone's understanding of this problem, not just us doing a better job as detectives, but prosecutors doing a better job, judges having an understanding, and the public having an understanding when they serve as a juror.

Robert (17:21)
Yeah. And it seems like it's sex trafficking for a lot of different reasons, but it seems like it's getting a lot more. the prevalence of that is getting a lot more spotlight now, which, which is, which is wonderful, which is wonderful. so are there, are there signs like somebody can look for that somebody's being trafficked? Like if I'm, you know, I was just flying earlier in the week, flying back and I'm in Atlanta, I was flying back.

to Atlanta and I actually thought of you because you you get back in Atlanta and there's tens of thousands of people in that busy airport. And I'm like, gosh, cause I was on the flight. was, thinking of questions to ask you. And so as I, as I got off and I'm walking through, like, I'm wondering if I'm like passing somebody that's being trafficked or are there, are there signs just in general, whether it's in the airport, whether it's anywhere and

Target, Walmart, grocery store, just out on the street driving. There's signs you can look for that somebody might be being trafficked.

Detective Heidi Chance (18:23)
Yeah, so on my website I have a resource. call it my sex trafficking indicators list. And it's basically a list of certain things that could be happening with someone you know that you could recognize and then how to approach whether or not to approach them about it or just to report it to help get them help. One thing, if you've ever heard of the branding tattoos.

Robert (18:49)
Yeah.

Detective Heidi Chance (18:50)
So the tattoos have two purposes in my mind. The one is this whole situation of the trafficker replacing an authority figure or father figure in a victim's life. That's the whole reason why they have victims call them daddy. That is intentional and it is where they have the victims being with the trafficker and being.

a part of something. So you'll have multiple victims with the same tattoo. And then the second purpose is to advertise to other traffickers, these ones are mine, I own these people. And it's modern day slavery in your face. I've even got pimps that have put their name on their victim's face, tattooed on there, and it's all intentional. Another indicator, yes, go ahead, yes, slavery. Another indicator is definitely the terminology.

Robert (19:37)
slavery.

Detective Heidi Chance (19:45)
So I talked about the name daddy, that's intentional. The nonary for prostitution is called the blade or the track. There's a term called out of pocket. If a victim is violating a traffickers rule, then they're out of pocket and they're going to get punished. know, the terminology in itself is an indicator because people don't speak that way naturally unless they're around people talking that way or in that lifestyle. And so...

Educating yourself about the terminology is an indicator. Other indicators could be, you know, we've all lived long enough to know that no one gives you anything for free without expecting something in return. And so if you have a victim or a person in your life that's, you know, being showered with gifts, especially if it's a kid, like who's giving this kid expensive gifts? And what did they have to do to get this gift? Like that's concerning that this random person is...

giving them gifts or money, know, if they have a large amount of money all of sudden. Multiple cell phones, hotel keys, lots and lots of things that I would say would be a potential indicator. Obviously if it's someone that, you know, is working at night or living with their employer or

they don't have their ID or their phone on them, like that would be weird. That's not normal. Like when I go teach this class at a college class, I ask, hey, can I have your phone and go through it? That's not normal, but it is for that lifestyle because the pimp is in complete control of everything of that victim's property and all, and they don't even have access to their own social media, all of those things. So those are all definitely indicators.

Robert (21:32)
Heidi, said, use the terminology that they, these.

evil people, the traffickers want to be called daddy. How prevalent is it with the victims where there's not a father figure or a strong father figure in their background or do you even know?

Detective Heidi Chance (21:50)
Well, I would say like we were, I think, discussing earlier about victims' vulnerabilities and how traffickers seek those things out. And I think not having a father figure is a vulnerability. I mean, I think there's an interview out there with a child predator where he would look to see if there was a dad in the life of the kid that he was targeting. And if there wasn't a dad, fair game. So I think that it's definitely an issue and causes a vulnerability in itself.

Robert (22:19)
Okay. What, what happens to those eventually that are being trafficked?

I imagine it's pretty horrific. doesn't end well, usually correct.

Detective Heidi Chance (22:30)
Yeah, so I've had lots of victims that I've interviewed as adults that when we're talking about this particular trafficker from this incident, there's typically other traffickers along their life and their history of being in the game. And a lot of them describe being kids. And they never were rescued. They never had law enforcement contact. They never knew that they could talk to anyone about it. And this became their life.

And part of that is also the trafficker telling them that this is all you're going to ever be. As far as their lifespan, I mean, obviously extremely dangerous, this behavior, not only with sexually transmitted diseases, but also this is a violent lifestyle. Traffickers carry guns, they fight, they shoot at each other. the innocent bystanders are a lot of times the victims that are in the car with that trafficker when there's beef with the other trafficker.

So very dangerous and very concerning.

Robert (23:29)
Wow. All right. So we've talked about the, we've talked about the traffickers. We've talked about the victims, these abusers, the Johns, the ones that are buying them. What do they look like? Who is that?

Detective Heidi Chance (23:44)
Yeah, wonderful question. So I think people's perception of a buyer or even a trafficker is that it has to be some creepy looking person. And it's like, you know, your perception of a bad guy and what they would look like. But I've had buyers as cops, as an undercover, walking up to the car, I see uniform pants and I'm like, no.

Robert (23:54)
Yeah.

Detective Heidi Chance (24:09)
Okay, I guess you're going to talk to me and I'm not going to stop because if you're engaging with me and you're trying to purchase me for sex, it is what it is. And we've arrested other cops, we've arrested doctors, we've arrested professional business people, CEOs of companies. know, it's a range of... The only thing that's consistent, unfortunately, is and I myself personally in the last 16 years working just this crime.

27 years total law enforcement, 16 justice crime. I've never met, nor have I met a colleague, have an experience of a woman buying sex. It's men buying sex. So I have to say, sorry not sorry, but that is the demographic that's purchasing people for this.

Robert (24:52)
And so it literally is, I mean, you're, you're seeing attorneys, judges, politicians, teachers, everything, like I know of a case here back in the fall where a high school football coach was arrested for it. And it just, I know some P some players on that team and

they were just like shocked that that happened and created a pretty big turmoil at the school as well. But that's just so shocking. So tell me what can parents do to protect their kids? You said Instagram, don't want to answer your question for you, but imagine if you've got a kid and they have Instagram, do you want their screens put, are there settings put on private?

What can parents do to protect their kids?

Detective Heidi Chance (25:41)
Yeah, think don't rely just on parental controls because my 12 year old niece bypassed parental controls and created a secret Instagram and my sister caught her on it and then we're trying to get her to send nude photos of herself. So don't rely on parental controls. Don't rely on someone else telling your kid about this like the school or somewhere else. It needs to be the job of a parent these days to have conversations with your child and

To put it in perspective, when I first started investigating human trafficking, the average national age of entry was 15 for youth. Today it's 13 years old and recently we've rescued a couple of 10, 11 year olds. So it is inching closer and closer to the younger numbers and younger, younger kids. So we need to have these conversations earlier than you would think. I would say when you decide to give them access to that app.

that they're asking for or that game or if you decide to give them a phone. The conversations need to be before then and all throughout them having these devices and access to these things. And those conversations need to be about, unfortunately, the bad things that you don't want to talk about. For example, just recently I caught a news interview of two parents who were talking to reporters about what happened to their son and their son

was on a game and he was conversing with a man and ended up sending an image and all of those things were going on and the mom commented that she had frontal controls and she commented to the reporter, didn't know I had to talk to my kid about someone sending a picture of their penis and it's that time right now and this kid was 12, this boy, it's time to start talking about those graphic things unfortunately because

Robert (27:35)
Yeah.

Detective Heidi Chance (27:36)
They need to be prepared. It's not if, it's when these things happen. And so you need to talk to them about, you know, if someone is asking you personal information about where you live, where your parents work, where you go to school, how old are your siblings, all of those kind of things. You need to talk to them if someone's coming in and messaging you, even if they're acting like a peer, a peer asking those personal questions too. If they're asking you to keep the conversation a secret or to delete the messages.

or to speak in some kind of code with emojis or acronyms. If you have conversations with your child and they're prepared for these things, when it happens, they're going to recognize it, number one, and number two, they're going to disengage talking to that person, and number three, they're going to come talk to you about it. That's the ideal situation. That's what I wrote my book about so that parents can be armed with this information and how to have those conversations so that we can prevent some of this from happening.

Robert (28:35)
You know, you're saying that, several years ago, so my oldest is about to be a junior in high school. Several years back, he had set up, you know, they're all on YouTube and there's there. I don't know what you call it, but they're like live streaming, playing a game, fortnight, whatever it is. And he had parental controls on there for him searching, but he can go.

and do that. And he had some followers and it wasn't very good. It wasn't very entertaining and listening to him, you could hear it was a kid. And one day I'm at the office and I just happened to put it on and I had looked back cause you can see at the time, I don't know if you still can, but you know, I would scroll through and you can see the conversations people might be having. And a lot of it was, or there was his friends, you know, and

And so for whatever reason, think I was on a, I think I was on a conference call and tells you how much attention I was playing the conference call, had my two monitors up and I had him and I'm watching the chat and there was a chat that somebody had reached out to him and it got, I could tell this was an adult and the questions got pretty personal, pretty quick.

And this is my son who is probably, he was probably fifth. I don't even think he was sixth grade, so probably fifth, sixth grade. And so I immediately went on there and typed in, I am his dad. I'm monitoring this. Do you realize that you're, you know, that you're chatting with somebody that's underage, blah, blah, blah, you know, I've screenshotted your, your name.

I'm reporting you to YouTube, all this stuff. And the guy was very apologetic. Got off. did. And I did. But we, at that time, that was it. It was his mom and I got together and we decided, look, this might be fun for him, but this can go off the rails so quickly. Fortunately, I was monitoring that. And you know, it scared my son too, because he didn't see, he didn't, he didn't see what was going on.

Detective Heidi Chance (30:28)
Yeah, good for you. Yeah.

have an appointment.

Robert (30:50)
He had, he didn't realize what was going on. And all of a sudden he sees, he sees me going in there saying, you know, I'm his dad. I, know, I'm monitoring this and he's like, Whoa, why is dad watching this and what's going on here? You know, it kind of shook him up. And I think that was, I think he wanted to end it then just as much as we did. and that, that did spur the conversation where.

Detective Heidi Chance (31:14)
Well.

Robert (31:18)
you know, they became a lot more aware of it. It also ended their live streaming and all of that.

Detective Heidi Chance (31:23)
Well, that individual probably didn't expect a parent to be paying attention. And that's what they're banking on.

Robert (31:28)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Because everybody else that was responding to them, they were all his friends. Like I could see their little names and I knew who it was. And you know, they're cheering them on and tell them, this and do that and shoot that person and all this and that, or build what or whatever they're building or whatever it is. And then you could tell like, this was an adult and it's like, my gosh. And I forgot to tell you. So going through there, found out this same guy.

had several different accounts on YouTube. Like, and he, and that was part of his thing was going on in these young chats, you know, going on where he found kids and chatting with him. It was scary. I mean, it was extremely scary seeing that. And, and, you know, just harmless. You don't think it's any big deal, but you know, I think about it. had a, I had a, Dr. Paz Lisa Paz was on several, several months ago.

Detective Heidi Chance (32:00)
So.

Robert (32:24)
And she was talking about your kid, like talking to your kids, uh, talking to your kids about sex, how to do it, when to do it, what age, everything else. And, know, and she had said, like, if your kids have one of these, if they have a smartphone, they are exposed to pornography. And so really what you're telling me is if you have a smartphone, you can be very, if your kids have a smartphone, they can be very exposed to being introduced to these traffickers that way. Correct. Is that fair?

Detective Heidi Chance (32:51)
Yeah, I

mean, I'm sure she said this too, but this is the white van. Now, you know what I mean? This is the creeper that can slide in and unfortunately it's into your house, not out in the neighborhood. It is into your child's bedroom through the means of the app or the game or the internet site that they're on. You know, in addition to, you know, kids just being exposed to pornography on simple Google, which also happens.

Robert (32:55)
Wow.

Detective Heidi Chance (33:19)
you've got these people who are able to private message your kids on these apps and social media and things. And that's where the real danger is definitely with the private messaging.

Robert (33:31)
Do you ever get scared with what you do? I know it's kind of going in a different direction, but do you? I would think it would be.

Detective Heidi Chance (33:31)
you

Yeah, I mean if you're not scared you're stupid. I you have to be cautious of... I mean I put away a lot of really evil people in prison. I have a lot of enemies for sure. You just have to take steps to protect your personal information. That's why I subscribe to Delete Me. I've had a Pimp do a public records request for my personnel file from prison. Like he had already accepted his plea. It was done and done.

and it was just a random all of sudden he's interested in finding out about who the detective was that just put him in jail. So that was unnerving for sure.

Robert (34:17)
And then, you know, a text I sent you, I told you, was praying for you and your team. It's gotta take, it's gotta, have you, do you become numb to this? It's in some ways like not numb to the victims, but I imagine you've seen it all. You know, you, I, I, I, know I can't even imagine, but I'm, I'm sure you have.

It's got to take a toll too. Like I would think that does it like when you come home at the end of the day or it's got to be tough.

Detective Heidi Chance (34:49)
Yeah.

Yeah, I think I've kept myself so busy that it's just finally catching up to me now because I'm actually I've had a couple of nightmares recently. There are certain TV shows I cannot watch because I get like PTSD or panic attacks over like like prison break. I cannot watch that movie or that TV show because I imagine what would happen and where would be the first location that somebody would go to.

Robert (35:07)
I'm sure.

Detective Heidi Chance (35:19)
if they got out. it's definitely something that keeps me up at night for some reason recently. I don't know why recently. Probably because I'm slowing down on all of everything that is catching up to me. But I think staying in the fight as far as all the outreach and the community awareness and the law enforcement training that I'm doing and trying to make my

Book of success, that's been a distraction for sure. So I'm just focusing on that.

Robert (35:53)
Let's, let's talk about that. Cause

you, you're on speaking, you have speaking engagements training. Can you kind of go into that before we wrap up?

Detective Heidi Chance (36:01)
Yeah,

yeah. So when I retired from Phoenix Police Department, I had a passion still for what I was doing, because I did it for almost 14 years just at Phoenix PD. And when I went to Arizona Department of Gaming as an undercover, I worked there for two years and got recruited away to the position I'm at now, back investigating human trafficking. But in that time at gaming, I created my business, A Chance for Awareness.com, pun intended on my last name.

But basically it has two missions. The one is the community outreach and awareness because again, it's so important to me to have an informed public to equal an informed jury because when I testify, I want a jury to wrap their head around me describing this person as a victim and see them as a victim as well as when I'm describing them walking freely down the side of the road with a phone in their hand.

I don't want the jury to think that to be trapped and not free to leave, you have to be handcuffed to the bed or locked in a bedroom somewhere. And that even in walking freely down the road, you could still be trapped in this lifestyle. And I need them to understand that. So that's super important to me. That's what the outreach is to the community. That's what started my purpose for the book. Talk to them is to do all the prevention that I can.

And then on the other side of it is the law enforcement training. I am really focused on female undercover school because as a female undercover, back in the day when I did this, I had like a 20 minute briefing and then I was out on the street being solicited by John's. And back then we didn't really have as many buyers that were word to the wise carrying handguns, had other things going on that they wanted to do.

to people who they think are throwaway people and we are out there unarmed on the streets posing as prostitutes. So very dangerous. Had I known what I know now, I would never have said yes to that. And so I think it's super important to train female undercovers. And then I have obviously other classes that I do like a class on patrol recognition to this.

situation because back in the police academy in 1998 I didn't have a class on human trafficking and as I'm talking to more officers out there nationally I'm realizing no one's teaching in the academy anything about human trafficking and in Phoenix we only started teaching in 2014 to our own patrol officers so you've got cops out there that are looking for gangsters and drug dealers and the pimps know that we don't see them and you know you could be pulling over a vehicle

Robert (38:31)
Really?

Right.

Detective Heidi Chance (38:44)
and they're super nice to you, go ahead and search my car officer, not a big deal. And the victims that are in the car with that suspect, as long as they keep their mouth shut, the trafficker is gonna be like, take the ticket and laugh and drive off because he's not gonna get caught with anything. The product is those people. So it's training and getting them to realize the signs and recognizing and then obviously asking for help and detective assistance and all that.

And then I have a class on victim interviewing because I'm a forensic interviewer and it's really a skill to get someone, because these kids that are sex trafficked, they're in love with their trafficker, they're loyal to them, they do not want to talk to me. So to get anything out of them is a skill that you need to be trained on. It isn't like a child sexual assault or a child abuse case. Those kids disclose. Those kids want to tell their story and talk about it. They tell it to the teacher or the counselor.

or the family member and then the detectives can talk to them. Our kids are like, yeah, I don't want to talk to you. And so getting through all of that and actually getting to an interview is very hard. And then interrogating these suspects, especially as a female detective, it's a strategy to use us to interview pimps because they think they can manipulate even us because we're inferior to them, according to them, as a female. And they think they can manipulate us. So it's a strategy to have a female undercover.

interview these interrogate these suspects and then putting these cases all together for successful prosecution these are hard cases homicide detectives they have it easy their victim is dead right there they're not going anywhere my victims might return to prostitution might use drugs might get arrested for a robbery tomorrow may take off and I will see them for a year these are hard cases and inspiring officers and detectives to go through all of the motions of

everything that you will go through trying to get this to a resolution and get a trafficker in jail is something that needs to be trained on and showing case studies and inspiring them to want to take up that role and do all those things is a job in itself. So that is what I have going on with my missions.

Robert (41:02)
It's a lot.

It's a lot. I would love to see you in the interrogation room. I bet you're great. I bet you are. I bet you come in there all nice acting, acting all, I act and all sweet and nice. And then little do they know. And they think, yeah, this little blonde, I'll intimidate her. I'll manipulate her. Little, little do they know what's sitting across the table from them.

Detective Heidi Chance (41:08)
I don't... Yeah, I think we done one really well.

Ah-ha. Yep.

Yes.

Yeah, well

it's the best when it's a pimp that I was catfishing and then I do the interview and I'm like, they don't recognize my voice? Okay, we're gonna play with, you know, that. It was funny.

Robert (41:41)
You know, you said

something I want to touch on this, because I've thought about, I've thought about this is w and we, did kind of touch on, but why don't they just leave? Like when they're walking the street or they're in a hotel lobby, you know, trying, trying to, trying to find these abusers, these purchasers, why don't they just leave? it, yeah.

Detective Heidi Chance (42:06)
Yeah, really good question.

Yeah, so I'm not going to speak for them, but it's been my experience through interviews and contacts with victims that it's almost like drugs. When you have someone on drugs and they're not ready to get off the drugs, they're not going to get off the drugs. This fast lifestyle, fast money, and the lure of and the promises that were offered to them by these traffickers are so convincing.

And then, you know, they do know that when they get out, they have to integrate back into society. They have to get a real job. They got to wake up at a normal time. They've got to work minimum wage probably because they don't have other opportunities given to them. They got to find housing, live in a shelter. They have to repair relationships with family. All of that's hard. This is easy over here. That's really hard. So it is not working for us.

you know, not having the resources to offer them when they do get out. So that's what we really need is we need businesses to take them on as employees at a rate higher than minimum wage, opportunities for schooling, housing, all of the things that, you know, they need, how to write a resume, how to do an interview, you know, the basic things that we take for granted. I mean, they may have been in the lifestyle.

from juvenile into their mid-20s, early 30s, and they're just getting out of the life in their 30s, and they have no idea what all was going on in real world that whole time.

Robert (43:43)
And I imagine for the victims, there's a lot of shame and embarrassment with that too. You know, you're talking about the afterlife and resume and all of that. There's a group here in Atlanta. I think it's called Most Men, let's see, yeah, Most Men Opposed to Sex Trafficking. And that is part of, I believe, what they do when they rescue these victims is help them.

Detective Heidi Chance (43:48)
Yeah. Yeah.

Robert (44:12)
you know, help them take those next steps, whether it's resume, finding housing, you know, finding a job, just trying to get them to get back, doing what they can to get back on their feet. And, know, it's something I wasn't even aware of.

Detective Heidi Chance (44:28)
Yeah, that's wonderful. We have just men, Arizona. So it's very cool to see men joining this fight also.

Robert (44:32)
Okay.

Yeah, I guess so. I mean, it's

going to take all of us. mean, my goodness. And this is not something that's small. Once I started digging into it more, I mean, this is huge. And it's in every city. It's hundreds of thousands of victims out there, if not millions, right? And unfortunately with the internet, I don't see it decreasing any time.

Detective Heidi Chance (44:43)
Yes.

Yeah, and I think what's also contributing to it is, you know, there's a lot of traffickers that it seems to be a generational thing. You know, like the car dealership guy wants to leave the car dealership to their kids, leaves the business to their kids. You've got this situation where I've had a lot of traffickers who were the descendant of another trafficker or their mom was involved in prostitution. It's a grown up thing where they grew up with it in their life.

Robert (45:30)
So a pimp passes down

his business to his son or grand, my gosh.

Detective Heidi Chance (45:32)
Yeah, it's a generational thing.

And that's where we probably should also focus on breaking that lifestyle there. And the other dynamic, I learned this from Arizona State University. They have the sex trafficking intervention and research portion of the college. And cops were really good about writing down white male, five foot seven, brown and brown, date of birth, blah, blah.

We don't write down how many white males in the month of May in 2024 solicit a prostitution. They're doing all that research to actually put real numbers to this. finding all of that data and sharing that data is helpful also.

Robert (46:14)
Wow, that's great. All right. So again, where can people find you?

Detective Heidi Chance (46:18)
Yeah, so I have my website, a chance for awareness.com, and I have not only that resource with the sex trafficking indicators list, but I also have like a decoding emojis, kind of glossary of this emoji with this. And then I put out on my Instagram, quite frequently, I'm most active on Instagram, a chance for awareness with the underscore under each word. Podcasts like this, clips of the podcast, clips of me doing training out in the public.

Robert (46:29)
Really?

Detective Heidi Chance (46:48)
You know, community awareness information, all of those things, not just about sex trafficking. I also just put on an online class for modern day situational awareness. That's really good for, you know, young teens, high school students. It's very relatable. I have clips from Instagram reels that I've captured that kind of prove the point that I'm coming across to say. And then I do have a class for parents, digital literacy, kind of an expansion of the book.

You know where I talk about more than just having the conversations but some of the other things like sextortion, luring a minor for sex, all the other crimes that are facing our children in the digital age that we have. And then I'm on LinkedIn, Heidi Chance. LinkedIn is huge for me, especially with law enforcement and my second mission with the law enforcement training. And and I'm having the book translated in Spanish.

because I'm trying to reach non-English speaking parents. I have a female officer that I'm supporting that is translating it for me and she's going to read it also in Spanish so I'll have an audiobook version. So I need help getting that shared to that community because it's a vulnerability too for parents who don't speak English and their kids speak English and a trafficker can do whatever they want to do because the parents don't know what's going on because of the language barrier.

Robert (47:47)
That's great.

All right, so before I let you go, is there anything else we need to cover? Any message, any additional message to parents?

Detective Heidi Chance (48:18)
Yeah, so in the airport, when you were in Atlanta airport, I'm sure you saw the National Human Trafficking Hotline. Yeah, the National Human Trafficking Hotline is great. It's just based in DC. And so I just want to explain when to use that and when to just call 911. Because if it's a crime in progress happening right now, you just witnessed a 12-year-old get in a car with what looks like a pimp. And never be afraid to call 911.

Robert (48:24)
Yeah.

Detective Heidi Chance (48:48)
That's what they're there for. It's concerning. It's two in the morning. She's out past curfew as it is. We can pull that car over. Don't worry about us finding probable cause to pull a car over. You just call. That would be 911. You don't have to have the patrol car come to your house. You can just be a good witness. You can provide this information over the phone, but make the call. And for the hotline itself, some states like Arizona now has their own hotline.

Robert (48:57)
find a way.

Detective Heidi Chance (49:15)
because of the delay of you reporting something to DC, they've got to figure out which state, which city, which police agency, which detective. That could be two or three days before someone's actually working the complaint you called in. So it's just local law enforcement, 911, your own state's hotline, and then if you want to, can report it to the National Hotline. The National Hotline was really made for survivors who were trying to get out of the life.

and they can call the hotline and they don't have to have law enforcement contact if they call the hotline. And that's something to think about too when you call the hotline, are they really going to call the police or not? So if you want the police to actually investigate and look into it, local law enforcement.

Robert (49:59)
Heidi, you and your team are angels out there doing the hard work and on the front line. And I just, appreciate you guys. I appreciate what you're doing and wish you guys the best of luck. I really do. And protection and everything else. I thank you for all that you, thank you for all you're doing and thank you for coming on. Cause you've got a lot going on in your life and I appreciate you taking time out of your day to come on. I really do.

Detective Heidi Chance (50:25)
Yeah.

Absolutely. Thank you for having me and let me know when you come back.

Robert (50:30)
It's a thing and I will post, I will post

all, all of your information, the links, the website, everything else. will certainly post it. And so anybody looking, you'll be able to find it down into the description and Heidi. Thank you again. And look, thank you all for listening to dad, dad's podcast. You can find us on Spotify or Apple podcast, pretty much every platform. You can also find us on YouTube and Instagram. Don't forget to hit the like and subscribe button.

Detective Heidi Chance (50:40)
Okay.

Robert (50:59)
As well as leave a comment. love reading the comments. I appreciate you guys providing feedback as well as future subjects that you would like for me to cover. And I look forward to talking to you guys next time.

Detective Heidi Chance (51:11)
Bye.