Rotary of West Liberty hears nightmare story on human trafficking

Typical little boy coerced into life that eventually took his life

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Living through a nightmare because her 15-year-old son was coerced and brainwashed into a life of drug addiction and sex trafficking, Lisa McCormick told a story no parent should ever have to live through as she addressed members of the Rotary Club of West Liberty Tuesday evening in a virtual meeting of the organization.

McCormick, who hails from rural Tomah, Wisconsin, eventually lost her son, Jeffrey, to a heroin overdose at the age of 17 (just three weeks before his 18th birthday).

Today, she shares her heart-breaking story that has put her on a mission to educate as many people as she can about the billion dollar business of sex and human trafficking, laced by drug addiction.

The local Rotary Club, which won a state award for education in the West Liberty School District on human trafficking as well as accomplishing other prevention ways in the fight, heard for one of the first times a real live story of a family that battled for over three years to get back the son they once knew.

McCormick told the club her son was a normal kid in sixth grade that reached a time in his life he was attempting to fit in, getting mixed up with a friend who had a dad who smoked marijuana, which McCormick said was the start of leading her son down the wrong path, eventually experimenting with more dangerous drugs, prescription pills and eventually leading him to a path into male prostitution and sex trafficking in Madison.

The mother said she didn’t know her son even had a drug problem until he was a freshman in high school and admitted he was hooked on drugs, placed into a hospital for rehabilitation the next six months.

McCormick warned parents that they really need to be on top of what their teenagers are doing on their phones and computers, noting parents and educators teach children all the dangers of getting behind the wheel of a car, but not the dangers hidden in smart phones, computers and computer games.

“Sex used to be a hidden Playboy under the bed,” she said, noting youngsters can get access to sexual websites through social media 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

She said most trafficking victims are slowly drawn into the system through “trusting” relationship building, predators taking advantage of latch-key children, homeless and depressed youngsters may not get the attention they or love they need from their parents or grandparents.

“They tell kids their parents don’t care about you. Your friends don’t care about you,” she said, creating a brainwashing.

McCormick said her goal is to not only be able to tell her son’s story, but be able to educate people, noting she never imagined it would exist in places like rural Wisconsin and has been part of a team that has created four filmed stories (including her own) about the dangers of human trafficking now to be shown to every middle school student in Wisconsin, where she sometimes talks herself about the issue.

She stressed that education needs to start no later than fifth grade and said anyone seeing something unusual should act. “Go with your gut. If you see something, say something,” McCormick said, noting it may not be anything and, then again, it may just be a human traffic situation.

She said although most traffic specialists take advantage of young women, more and more males are also getting roped into the world – estimated to be about 40 percent in Wisconsin alone. She said her son was even chorused to Iowa and as far as Sioux City during his time with his “pimps” that kept him drugged and brainwashed.

McCormick said she vowed at her son’s funeral that she was going to do everything she could not to let another family go through what she went through.”

She said 93 percent of all traffickers in Wisconsin are drug related – much more than the 60 percent statistic for the nation.

She called her son a “normal, regular kid” in his pre-teen years, a “typical little boy” who failed to fit in when he got into middle school. She said typically traffickers work on attracting 11-14 year olds, but she’s heard of children as young as 18 months and adults as old as 64 taken in by the trade.

McCormick pointed out several ways kids can be drawn into the trafficking world and said five years ago, she didn’t know what drug trafficking was.

One Rotarian said she’s had experiences with her teenagers that could have put her family in the same boat, calling McCormick’s story courageous and pointing out it she’s no different than most moms.

“You tell such a compelling story,” said Bill Koellner, president of the club, while Rotarian Tom Barr thanked McCormick for “bringing it all to mind again,” noting Rotary still has work to do in combating human trafficking.

Tim Evans, editor of the Index, who wrote McCormick’s story in the Monroe County Herald newspaper he used to work for a couple years ago, introduced the program. McCormick said that interview and publishing of that story helped her build the courage to tell it again and again and continue her fight for Jeffery.

Rotary of West Liberty claimed an award earlier this year as one of several 2021 Iowa Outstanding Anti-Trafficking Service Awardees from the Iowa Network Against Human Trafficking and Slavery. Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds at the State Capital presented the award.

In other business, Rotarians are asking members to provide interviews in honor of the club’s 100th anniversary on Dec. 16, 2021. Online video interviews will be conducted. Ethan Anderson is steering the project with the help of Steve Hanson.

The local organization meets every Tuesday virtually at 5 p.m. Anyone interested in finding out more about the Rotary Club of West Liberty should contact Koellner or any member.

Members will be gathering Saturday morning at the West Liberty Community Center to pick up garbage for spring clean-up along Route 6 west of the community in a designated two-mile stretch. Anyone is welcome to aid the organization, leaving for the ditches at 9 a.m.

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