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Trafficking in persons

  • 279.01 (1) Every person who recruits, transports, transfers, receives, holds, conceals or harbours a person, or exercises control, direction or influence over the movements of a person, for the purpose of exploiting them or facilitating their exploitation is guilty of an indictable offence and liable

    • (a) to imprisonment for life and to a minimum punishment of imprisonment for a term of five years if they kidnap, commit an aggravated assault or aggravated sexual assault against, or cause death to, the victim during the commission of the offence; or

    • (b) to imprisonment for a term of not more than 14 years and to a minimum punishment of imprisonment for a term of four years in any other case.

  • Marginal note:Consent

    (2) No consent to the activity that forms the subject-matter of a charge under subsection (1) is valid.

  • Marginal note:Presumption

    (3) For the purposes of subsections (1) and 279.011(1), evidence that a person who is not exploited lives with or is habitually in the company of a person who is exploited is, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, proof that the person exercises control, direction or influence over the movements of that person for the purpose of exploiting them or facilitating their exploitation

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Many people refer to human trafficking as a contemporary kind of slavery. It entails enlisting, transporting, harbouring, and/or controlling an individual's movements in order to take advantage of them, typically through forced labour or sexual services.

 

Both the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) and the Criminal Code make human trafficking a crime. Because human trafficking is a covert crime, it is difficult to determine its scope both domestically and abroad, according to Public Safety Canada. Indigenous women, recent immigrants, and migrant labourers who work in rural locations and do not know French or English are the groups most at danger.

The relatively high number of incidents in Ontario may be attributed to the concentration of urban areas in the province, as such population centres may form part of human trafficking corridors, used by traffickers to increase profits, avoid detection and isolate victims through psychological control," according to StatsCan. It further states that one-third of victims were trafficked by an intimate relationship, and nine out of ten victims knew their alleged trafficker.

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