FOUNDER & DIRECTOR Professor Roza Pati Director, Human Trafficking Academy Executive Director, LL.M./ J.S.D. Program in Intercultural Human Rights St. Thomas University School of Law, Member, Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, the Vatican Professor Roza Pati is a tenured Professor of Law at St. Thomas University School of Law. She teaches International Law, Comparative Law, Human Rights & Terrorism and Human Trafficking Law. Formerly a Member of Parliament and a Cabinet Member serving as the Secretary of State for Youth and Women of Albania, Dr. Pati has been involved in antitrafficking work since the early 90s. She has a rich experience in public service as well as academia and is a prolific scholar. In 2005, she facilitated the preparation of The Miami Declaration of Principles on Human Trafficking, 1 INTERCULTURAL HUM. RTS. L. REV. 11 (2006), a set of law and policy recommendations, and she lectures on human trafficking at academic and governmental institutions around the world. Some of her publications in the field of combating human trafficking include: Human Trafficking as Modern Day Slavery: A Human Rights Approach, in THE SAGE HANDBOOK OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING AND MODERN DAY SLAVERY (forthcoming, 2017, SAGE Publications) Trafficking in Persons and Transnational Organized Crime: A Policy-Oriented Perspective, in HANDBOOK ON HUMAN TRAFFICKING, PUBLIC HEALTH AND THE LAW: A SPRING SCHOOL FORM THE NEW HAVEN PERSPECTIVE (2014, Georg Thieme Verlag). Human Trafficking: An Issue of Human and National Security, 3 NATIONAL SECURITY AND ARMED CONFLICT LAW REVIEW 29 (2014). The Categorical Imperative to End Modern-Day Slavery: Subsidiarity, Privatization, and the State s Duty to Protect, in DER STAAT IM RECHT 1219 (2013, Duncker & Humblot). Trading in Humans: A New Haven Perspective, 20 ASIA PACIFIC L. REV. 135 (2012). Combating Human Trafficking Through Transnational Law Enforcement Cooperation: The Case of South Eastern Europe, in POLICING ACROSS BORDERS: LAW ENFORCEMENT NETWORKS AND THE CHALLENGES OF CRIME CONTROL (2012, Springer). Beyond the Duty to Protect: Expanding Accountability and Responsibilities of the State in Combating Human Trafficking, in THE DIVERSITY OF INTERNATIONAL LAW 319 (2009, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers).
Greg H. Bristol Former FBI Special Agent Founder and President The Human Trafficking Investigations & Training Institute (HTITI) Front Royal, Virginia After graduating from Michigan State University with a B.A. in Criminal Justice, Greg Bristol became a Trooper for the Michigan State Police, and served nine years at their Northville and Detroit Freeway Posts. In 1987, he became a FBI Special Agent and was assigned to the FBI s Washington Field Office. His duties included Foreign Counterintelligence, Public Corruption, Corporate Fraud, and Civil Rights. Mr. Bristol received the Attorney General s Award for Exceptional Service for his contributions to the Enron Task Force, a five-year assignment that brought criminal charges against 36 defendants. In 2006, he was assigned to a Civil Rights squad, where he focused on hate crime and human trafficking. One of Mr. Bristol s 2009 FBI domestic servitude rescues is featured in the movie Not My Life. After retiring in 2010, Mr. Bristol became a Special Agent with the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, and worked complex contract fraud cases in Kandahar, Afghanistan. In 2012, Mr. Bristol created The Human Trafficking Investigations & Training Institute (HTITI), a company that offers advanced human trafficking investigation courses to law enforcement. His courses have been taught in eight states and in the Caribbean. Mr. Bristol is an instructor with the University of Louisville s Southern Police Institute, where he teaches police command officers why they need to train their officers in advanced human trafficking investigations. He is also a U.S. Department of Justice Office for Victims of Crimes human trafficking expert consultant. Mr. Bristol narrated a 2014 UNICEF Public Service Announcement on child sex trafficking in the US, and is a frequent speaker to community groups interested in learning more about human trafficking. He can be contacted through HTITI s website at www.humantraffickingtraining.info.
Joseph Martinez Former NCIS Special Agent Partner, Human Trafficking Investigations and Training Institute (HTITI) Lake Shore, Maryland At the age of 13, Mr. Martinez realized he wanted to be a Federal Agent and to that end he concentrated both his Bachelors and Masters studies on Criminal Justice. Immediately afterwards the predecessor to Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) came calling and hired him. Mr. Martinez s first 3 years were filled with investigations into all types of felonies such as homicides, rapes, aggravated assaults, etc. aboard various USN aircraft carriers and at the Norfolk Naval Station. After this assignment he was asked to specialize in Counterintelligence (CI), a career path he embraced with passion. He was able to help protect his country by placing spy's in jail. Spy's that we're trying to steal highly specialized research the US Navy and the Department of Defense had developed to save lives and win wars. Through the years Mr. Martinez was the NCIS Case Agent on espionage investigations such as the John Walker investigation; the Sergeant Ken Kelliher investigation and the investigation into John Charlton, a contractor for Lockheed. Mr. Martinez also discovered espionage indicators that led to the initiation of a National Security Investigation leading to the eventual prosecution of Stewart David Nozette, a scientist who worked for NASA and the White House s National Space Council, for attempted espionage. Mr. Martinez retired from NCIS in 2008. After serving as a Senior Staff member for the Director, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) as an NCIS Special Agent the Director asked if he would retire from NCIS and return to DARPA as his CI consultant to create a new Counterintelligence architecture plan that incorporated DARPA s disparate Security entities. At risk was DARPA s ($3.2 billion annual 2008 budget) Research and Development programs and personnel from foreign exploitation, including vulnerable collaborative research projects with foreign countries. Mr. Martinez provided DARPA leadership with processes and data of pertinent suspected and/or confirmed Foreign Intelligence Officers, their technical objectives, and their DARPA targets. While at DARPA Mr. Martinez created and implemented a Functional Counterintelligence Program that integrated all the Counterintelligence related functions at DARPA: Network Information Assurance, Polygraph, International Security, Technical Security Countermeasures (TSCM), CI Investigations and a CI Analytical Section. This integrated program increased protection against dynamic foreign intelligence threats and served as a model for other Defense Agencies to emulate. After DARPA Mr. Martinez was hired by the Defense Intelligence Agency where he taught the Advanced Foreign Counterintelligence Operations Course to federal agents for four years. While there Mr. Martinez was part of the team that won the coveted Department of Defense CI & HUMINT Enterprise Team Award. In early 2016, Mr. Martinez was asked to join the Human Trafficking Investigations and Training Institute s efforts to combat human trafficking. It was clear human trafficking awareness programs had worked in educating the public, yet many Police Departments did not know how to deal effectively with this heinous crime. Mr. Martinez, along with his associates, provide Anti- Human Trafficking related instruction to Judges, Police Departments, Federal Agencies, Universities, Coast Guards, 911 Operators, in the US, the Caribbean and South & Central America.
Ana Isabel Vallejo, Esq. Co-Director/Attorney VIDA Legal Assistance, Inc. Ms. Ana Isabel Vallejo is a co-director of VIDA Legal Assistance, Inc., a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the rights of immigrant survivors of domestic violence, sexual violence, trafficking in persons and other violent crimes. From 2011 to 2013 she was the Project Coordinator for the Human Trafficking Academy of the Graduate Program in Intercultural Human Rights at St. Thomas University School of Law. Prior to her joining St. Thomas University and VIDA, she supervised a team of four attorneys and three paralegals, while representing lowincome immigrant women and children victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, rape, incest, and other gender related violent crimes. For more than 10 years, Ms. Vallejo has dedicated her practice to representing survivors of human trafficking (modern -day slavery). She has worked tirelessly in collaboration with the US Department of Justice, Criminal Section Civil Rights Division, the US Attorney s Office, The Federal Bureau of Investigations and the Department of Homeland Security to insure that victims of trafficking have access to justice. Recently, Ms. Vallejo appeared as a witness before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission where she testified on issues related to trafficking-in-persons in the context of the agricultural industry in Florida. Ms. Vallejo has also participated as faculty in international trainings and conferences geared towards law enforcement and government officials sponsored by the Department of Justice, Criminal Division Office of Prosecutorial Development, Assistance and Training (OPDAT) in Panama, El Salvador, and Mexico. Additionally, she has presented in international conferences on the topic of access to justice for survivors of trafficking in persons in Thailand, Spain and Puerto Rico. Prior to working with survivors of trafficking in persons, Ms. Vallejo represented hundreds of victims of human rights violations seeking protection in the United States. In the course of her duties, she appeared before the Department of Homeland Security s Bureaus of Citizenship and Immigration Services and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (formerly the Immigration and Naturalization Service), the Executive Office for Immigration Review and the Board of Immigration Appeals. Additionally, Ms. Vallejo s experience includes the research and writing of three amicus curiae briefs -- two for the European Court of Human Rights and one for the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. She has researched and written in the area of Women s Human Rights specifically the issues of female genital mutilation, forced prostitution and trafficking of women for commercial sexual exploitation. She received a B. A. in Political Science and a B. A. in International Affairs from Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin; a law degree from St. Thomas University School of Law, ; and a Master of Laws degree in Inter-Cultural Human Rights Law from St. Thomas University School of Law,, where she graduated cum laude.
Maria Jose Fletcher, Esq. Co-Director/Attorney VIDA Legal Assistance, Inc. Maria Jose T. Fletcher is an attorney co-director and founder of VIDA Legal Assistance, Inc., a non-profit organization formed to advance the rights of immigrant survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, trafficking in persons and other violent crimes. Ms. Fletcher is actively involved in local, state and national domestic violence and victim s rights organizations. She prepares and conducts educational presentations and trainings in the areas of immigration, domestic violence, and trafficking in persons. She has been invited to present at conferences, seminars and workshops by the US Department of State, the US Department of Justice, including the Office on Violence Against Women, and by national and international non-governmental organizations to address the needs of immigrant survivors. Among the countries and territories visited by Ms. Fletcher are: Austria, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, El Salvador, Filipinas, Guatemala, Honduras, Northern Mariana Islands, Morocco, Mexico, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicaragua, Dominican Republic, Peru and Uruguay. Since 2001, Ms. Fletcher has been working in collaboration with numerous governmental agencies and non-profit organizations to ensure that survivors of human trafficking have access to protections and justice, by providing free legal assistance and coordination of other necessary services. Through VIDA, Ms. Fletcher participates in educational projects dedicated to prevent trafficking in persons, labor exploitation and sexual violence in the work place. Among other functions, Ms. Fletcher completed a two-year commitment (2010-2012) as one of fifteen members of the National Advisory Committee on Violence Against Women, chartered by the US Attorney General. The role of the committee was to provide recommendations on the prevention of domestic violence to the US Department of Justice and the US Department of Health and Human Services. The Committee s report was issued on November 30, 2012. Since 2003, Ms. Fletcher has been a regional and national coordinator of the Freedom Network Training Institute (FNTI), created to provide training and technical assistance to multidisciplinary audiences on the subject of trafficking in persons a national project of the Freedom Network USA and since 2011 is a Board member of the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence (NRCDV). Previously, and for over 10 years, Ms. Fletcher has been an advisory board member of the National Network to End Violence Against Immigrant Women and a founding member and past co-chair of the Freedom Network to Empower Trafficked and Enslaved Persons (USA). In 2005, on the International Women s Day, Global Rights named Ms. Fletcher a Human Rights Defender for her work on behalf of victims of trafficking. Ms. Fletcher received a B.A. in Political Science from the University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida and a J.D. from Nova Southeastern University, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.
Barbara A. Martinez, Esq. Assistant United States Attorney (AUSA) Chief, Special Prosecutions Section Human Trafficking & Project Safe Childhood Coordinator, SDFL Miami United States Attorney s Office Assistant United States Attorney (AUSA) Barbara A. Martinez is the Chief of the Special Prosecutions Section in the Miami United States Attorney s Office. In this capacity, AUSA Martinez supervises federal prosecutors who handle cases involving child exploitation, human trafficking, and violent crime involving death or serious bodily injury, which include serial bank robberies, hostage takings, and gang-related activity. AUSA Martinez is also the Human Trafficking Coordinator and the Project Safe Childhood Coordinator for the Southern District of Florida. As the District s Coordinator for these programs, AUSA Martinez is responsible for coordination between non-governmental entities, federal, state, and local law enforcement officers, and prosecutors in the Southern District of Florida who assist in the investigation and prosecution of child exploitation and human trafficking cases. AUSA Martinez earned her law degree from the University of Texas School of Law. She joined the Department of Justice in 1997 as a Trial Attorney through the Attorney General s Honors Program. She worked for the Fraud Section in the Criminal Division from 1997 until 2000, when she joined the United States Attorney s Office in Miami. Some of her notable awards include the 2015 Director s Award for Superior performance as an AUSA for the prosecution of a sex trafficking case; 2013 Women in Federal Law Enforcement s Top Prosecutor Award for her work on human trafficking, the Department of Justice s 2011 Outstanding Overall Partnership Coalition Group Award for her work and contributions on cases involving domestic sex trafficking of minors; 2005 Department of Justice s Director s Award for Superior Performance as an Assistant United States Attorney for the prosecution of a production of child pornography and sex tourism case that involved more than 100 victims; and the 2010 Director s Honor Award from the U.S. Secret Service for work on a multimillion dollar computer intrusion case.
Benjamin Widlanski, Esq. Assistant United States Attorney (AUSA) Special Prosecutions Section Miami United States Attorney s Office Mr. Benjamin Widlanski graduated from Columbia University with a bachelor s degree in philosophy and religion, and then attended Columbia Law School, from which he graduated in 2007 as a Harlan Fiske Stone scholar. After working as an associate at the New York City offices of Boies, Schiller, and Flexner, Mr. Widlanski joined the United States Army, and served in Hawaii and Afghanistan with the 8th Theater Sustainment Command, the 25th Infantry Division, and the 4th Infantry Division, receiving, among other awards, the Bronze Star. After leaving the Army, Mr. Widlanski began working as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of Florida. He has worked in the appellate division, where he had multiple arguments before the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, and the major crimes division, prosecuting narcotics, firearms, and child pornography cases; he now works in the special prosecutions section of the Miami office, where he focuses on violent gangs, child exploitation, and human trafficking prosecutions.
Brenda Mezick, Esq. Assistant State Attorney Chief, Human Trafficking Unit (Development & Public Policy) Miami-Dade State Attorney s Office Brenda Mezick is the Chief of Program Development & Public Policy for the Human Trafficking Unit in the Office of the State Attorney for Miami-Dade County. Over the course of her twenty-two years as an Assistant State Attorney, she has specialized in the prosecution of offenses involving human trafficking, cyber-crimes, capital sexual battery, and homicides. She has forensic sub-specializations in the areas of digital evidence investigation and DNA. Ms. Mezick supervises her office s ground breaking Human Trafficking-Child Plan and Recovery initiative. She has participated in the drafting of several successful legislative initiatives to help improve Florida s legal infrastructure for minors and human trafficking victims. She has taught for the National District Attorneys Association, the Florida Prosecuting Attorneys Association, and the American Bar Association s Rule of Law Initiative. She has presented at numerous police department trainings, conferences, and community events. Ms. Mezick received her law degree from Georgetown University. She is the recipient of the Florida Attorney General s Human Trafficking Prosecutor of the Year Award, the Women s Fund Law Enforcement Visionary Award, the National Crime Victims Rights Committee Justice for All Award, the CABA Pro Bono Award, the Dade Chiefs of Police ASA Recognition Award, and the Mothers Against Drunk Driving Award of Distinction.
Bretton Engle, Ph.D., LCSW Assistant Clinical Professor Florida International University College of Medicine Bretton Engle, Ph.D., LCSW, is the founder of the Emotional Memory Center, where he trains other professionals and treats trauma survivors. He is an Assistant Clinical Professor at the Florida International University College of Medicine and was an Associate Professor at Barry University for the last 10 years. Dr. Engle is a long standing member of the Motivational Interviewing Network of Trainers, and his dissertation was funded by the National Institute of Health. He is also a comedian and keynote speaker and has presented for dozens of professional and academic organizations. He has published reviews as well as his original motivational interviewing training research in book chapters and peer reviewed journals. Dr. Engle specializes in therapeutic techniques that facilitate engagement and disclosure of relevant information as well as competency based, person-centered, clinical education and training to promote health, social justice, and human rights.
Sean Sellers Director of Strategic Partnerships (WSR Network) National Economic & Social Rights Initiative (NESRI) Sarasota, Florida Prior to joining the Worker-driven Social Responsibility (WSR) Network as Director of Strategic Partnerships in 2016, Mr. Seller's career has focused on supporting the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) efforts to improve U.S. farm labor conditions. From 2003 to 2010, he worked in several capacities on the Campaign for Fair Food, including in Immokalee, Florida as national co-coordinator of the Student/Farmworker Alliance, and later as a W.K. Kellogg Foundation Food and Society Fellow. In 2011, due to the success of the Campaign for Fair Food, Mr. Seller s work pivoted to the implementation of the Fair Food Program, first across the Florida tomato industry and then spanning the East Coast as far north as New Jersey. As a founding staff member and senior investigator at the Fair Food Standards Council in Sarasota, Florida, Mr. Seller played a leading role in designing, testing and refining the Fair Food Program s audit regime and data management systems as well as researching and co-authoring its public annual reports. Currently, Mr. Seller works to identify, train and support worker and labor organizations in the U.S. and internationally as they design and implement worker-led programs that improve wages and working conditions in corporate supply chains. Mr. Seller has a BS in Communication Studies and an MA in Latin American Studies from the University of Texas at Austin, where his master s thesis on the CIW received outstanding honors. His writing has also appeared in the Huffington Post, The Nation, The University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change, and Race/Ethnicity (Ohio State University).
Janet Basilan Survivor Vice Chairperson, GABRIELA USA Washington, D.C. Ms. Janet Basilan is a mother and a pre-k teacher with Bright Start Preschool in Washington, D.C. She serves as the current Vice-Chairperson of GABRIELA USA, a Filipina Women's alliance, and is an active member of GABRIELA Washington, D.C. where she first started her activism. Ms. Basilan raised the legal issue of the trafficked survivors/victims in Washington, D.C. to a political struggle highlighting the issue of forced migration of women from the Philippines. She has worked to galvanize the broadest number of teacher-victims and support for the campaign and work of GABRIELA D.C., and has been instrumental to the campaign strategy for the Justice for Filipino Trafficked Teachers. Ms. Basilan s ability to engage with women, encourage their participation, and unite survivors in their struggle for justice is a critical component for the organization. Her leadership empowers women in the Filipino community to come out of the shadows, fight for their rights and seek justice for all victims of human trafficking.
Professor Roy Balleste Professor of Law St. Thomas University School of Law Roy Balleste is Professor of Law and Law Library Director, St. Thomas University School of Law. He completed his doctorate degree (J.S.D.) in Intercultural Human Rights (analyzing internet governance, including its history, actors, institutions and human rights considerations). Professor Balleste teaches internet governance, cybersecurity and international legal research. Professor Balleste has concentrated his scholarship in the areas of internet governance, human rights and the relationship between information, technology, and people. In November 2007, he participated in the Second UN Internet Governance Forum in Rio de Janeiro. He also participated in the Fifth UN Internet Governance Forum in Vilnius, Lithuania, September 2010.Before attending the meeting in Vilnius, Professor Balleste submitted a comment supporting the continuation of the IGF beyond its original five-year mandate, which the IGF Secretariat noted in the Open Consultations Synthesis Paper of February 9, 2010. Professor Balleste is a member of the Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet) where he served as secretary of the Steering Committee from December 2010 to December 2012. Professor Balleste is also a member of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers' Noncommercial Users Stakeholder Group (ICANN-NCSG) and the Noncommercial Users Constituency (NCUC) of the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO). He served as a member of ICANN NCUC's Executive Committee as the Representative for North America from December 2013 to December 2015. His primary focus is on GNSO issues that deal with the protection of the user. Balleste was a member of the 'Thick' Whois Policy Development Process Working Group (November 2012- November 2013). The Policy Development Process (PDP) Working Group (WG) was chartered to provide the Council of the Generic Names Supporting Organization with a policy recommendation regarding the use of identifiable information of domain registrants, both existing and future. Professor Balleste served one tour in the US. Navy and one tour in the U.S. Army. He is a life member of the Disabled American Veterans. In March, 2015, Roman and Littlefield published his book, Internet Governance: Origins, Current Issues, and Future Possibilities, and in December 2015, Cybersecurity: Human Rights in the Age of Cyberveillance (coedited with Dr. Joanna Kulesza).
Beatriz Susana Uitts, LL.M. J.S.D. Candidate LL.M./J.S.D. Program in Intercultural Human Rights St. Thomas University School of Law Beatriz Susana Uitts is presently a J.S.D. student at St. Thomas University School of Law, where she also holds an LL.M. in Intercultural Human Rights, cum laude. She is a lawyer specialized in labor law from the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá D.C., Colombia, where she served as a labor law professor in the Legal Aid Clinic, providing students with the best legal advice and defense in workers judicial processes. The dissertation topic and research in her doctoral studies focuses on a critical analysis of the international response to the growing problem of human trafficking via the Internet, and aims at suggesting an effective solution to the problem. Her LL.M. thesis Freedom of expression and citizen participation through global cyberspace in the promotion, protection, and dissemination of human rights inspired her to explore farther the topic of human trafficking and technology, which she is now dedicated to thoroughly study in the J.S.D. program at St. Thomas Law. Mrs. Uitts is a member of the South Florida Human Trafficking Task Force, the Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet), the Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC) in the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), and the Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group (NCSG) in the ICANN. Beatriz Susana offers presentations at trainings and seminars regarding human trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC), domestic violence, and the intersection between human trafficking and technology. Mrs. Uitts previously worked as a victim advocate for the Coordinated Victims Assistance Center (CVAC) in Miami-Dade County s Community Action and Human Services Department. In this role, she also served at Safespace North Domestic Violence Center for battered women and assisted victims at the State of Florida 11th Judicial Circuit the Lawson E. Thomas Courthouse Center, Domestic Violence Division. Mrs. Uitts previously assisted in managing the Miami-Dade County Human Trafficking Collaborative Project grant from the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs Office for Victims of Crime by helping to coordinate a community response to victims of human trafficking via intensive case management. Beatriz Susana has worked for the Miami-Dade County Human Trafficking Coalition (MDCHTC). She has provided care and was tasked with ensuring the well-being and rights of minors when she served as lead resident counselor at His House Children s Home Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) Program.