USF's human trafficking research lab gets nearly $3 million grant to jumpstart statewide database

TAMPA, Fla. - The federal government awarded the University of South Florida $3 million for their human trafficking research lab as researchers work to find out the full scope of the crisis in Florida.

Governor Ron DeSantis signed a law last year to make USF’s Trafficking in Person lab the state’s central database for human trafficking, and the federal funding pushes that effort forward. 

"I met with an eight-year-old boy who had been trafficked. And, in our conversations, he let me know that being trafficked made him feel invisible, that no one saw him anymore," said Joan Reid, a criminology professor and director at USF’s Trafficking in Persons research lab. "And, I think a lot of trafficking survivors feel that way."