By Gerri Miller
Staff Writer
The rain may have cancelled Angelica Brook’s plan for a Human Trafficking Awareness Rally in Wetumpka last Saturday, but it didn’t dampen her enthusiasm for an issue on which she has great passion.
The Pensacola native, who has been a Wetumpka resident for five years now, is founder of both Angelica Brooks Investigative Services and The Silent Voices Project. She said the rally will be rescheduled sometime in November and hopefully will be held indoors.
Brooks said her early love of crime shows carried her into the forensics field, then toward her real calling: investigating trafficking, missing persons, and cold cases for families with few resources. She has done everything from helping conduct autopsies in a morgue to criminal investigations.
As an investigator, she has seen many cases of young girls who get involved with older men and go missing. This led to her interest in human trafficking and the creation of The Silent Voices Project.
“We have a serious problem with our kids because they think it can never happen to them,” Brooks said. “We want to reach out and educate our youth on how to better protect themselves.” She said a trafficker might not be a stranger- it could be an uncle, boyfriend or even a parent. She said the problem is especially prominent in Montgomery, but Elmore and Autauga counties are not immune to the problem.
The Project’s motto is “to be a voice to the voiceless.” The nonprofit organization helps families whose loved ones are missing or have fallen victim to human trafficking. “We also look into murder investigations that have gone unsolved,” Brooks said.
Brooks said one time she was approached by a woman who had been looking for her daughter for six months. She had little money, so Brooks took her case pro bono. “There were several leads, but also a lot of misinformation. I was able to identify her last known location and the people who most likely took her and pass that information forward to law enforcement. So far there’s no happy ending on that front, but at least we found some additional leads,” she said.
“As I put hours of digging into that case, I thought back to those broken homes I saw as a child abuse investigator. I thought about underprivileged families who had little recourse when a loved one went missing or a case went cold. I thought about how law enforcement could get so bogged down with cases, they ran out of time and manpower to dedicate to families. That’s when I decided to start a nonprofit to help those families. My four best friends backed my plan and helped me get the organization up and running,” she said.
She said she has a team of about 12 volunteers located throughout several states who help with research and events. Team members from Florida, Mississippi, and Alabama are available to train staff members, educators, doctor’s offices, medical personnel, and hotel hospitality staff.
“I have a great team that really helps out,” Brooks said. “I think that’s what makes me have that drive and passion.”
One of Silent Voices’ current research projects is putting together national data on missing persons, “We’ve partnered with a Nigerian nonprofit that helps child migrant survivors learn a trade and start new lives. And we’re developing a program called Release to help women survivors of domestic violence and trafficking overcome their past and begin a new chapter,” Brooks said.
Brooks already does a lot of advocacy work with victims throughout the world. She also has a podcast on human trafficking, The Justice Show (Justicetalkshow.us).
Another project Brooks is especially proud of is the Natavia Box because she said she wants to empower women. The pink box is stuffed with raffia and self-defense gear such as tasers that look like flashlights, alarms, and pepper spray. The box also includes a form that will document all relevant information needed to help find someone who has gone missing. Brooks launched that project in February.
The brand for the product is a combination of Brooks’ daughters names and means “strong woman.” More information on the box and pricing can be found at https://www.abinvestigate.com/natavia.
Brooks said human traffickers are getting more creative in the way they kidnap victims. She said one group formed a “Moms Meet Up” group where moms and children came to socialize. It turned out to be a kidnapping scheme.
She said much sex trafficking is hidden behind prostitution. Her next project will take her and her trained volunteers to hotels and other places where women and children are being trafficked and establishing relationships.
“We aren’t going to be able to get them out the first time,” she said. “Our hope is that they will transition to want a change in their lives.”
For more about the project, visit www.silentvoicesproject.org or visit Angelica’s investigative service at www.abinvestigate.com
