South Carolina group works to raise awareness to prevent child sex trafficking
ROCK HILL, S.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — Child sex trafficking is a growing problem with a new lawsuit in York County underscoring the issue.
The families of two preteen girls are suing Uber, accusing the ride-sharing company of playing a role in one of their daughters’ sexual assault.
“Let’s be honest, they’re after our children. The average age of a trafficking victim [is believed to be] 12 to 14 years old these days or 12 to 16 years old, but it’s young and it’s getting younger. And so prevention is a big part of what we do,” says Switch Executive Director Oliver Lollis.
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Lollis heads a grassroots organization working to end sex trafficking and sexual exploitation in South Carolina.
“It’s definitely the fastest-growing crime in the world, which is crazy,” Lollis said. “And the United States is the largest consumer of sex trafficking.”
He says the nonprofit group has five primary programs: awareness, prevention, demand, intervention and restoration.
“When someone wants out, we can help them and we walk with them from the time from, step one, meeting that first need, whether it’s a place to stay, maybe it’s rehab, maybe it’s dental work, maybe it’s a doctor, all the way to where they don’t need us anymore,” he told Queen City News. “And we walk with them as long as that takes,”
While adults are at risk of being trafficked, minors face even greater peril. Lollis says the common denominator with trafficked minors is the cellphone.
“At the end of the day, these traffickers have been trained to manipulate children,” he explained. “Children’s minds aren’t fully developed, obviously, and so they don’t really have a concept that ‘this person is trying to take advantage of me, and I cannot trust them.’”
Lawyers believe 19-year-old Fayvion Jarrod Williams played a role in a November 2023 sex trafficking case. Now he’s in prison for at least five years for luring two girls younger than 14 to his Gaston County home for sex through Facebook Messenger.
Lawyers for the girls’ families say he ordered two Uber rides for them round trip from Rock Hill to Gaston County, North Carolina.
Lollis emphasizes the importance of policing children’s social media.
“It’s important to keep a pulse on because the top three ways traffickers are getting to their victims are through your Instagrams or Facebook, your TikToks of the world,” he said. “And so they’re going to where the kids are and knowing that they can also pick them up just as easily as they can get to them online. It’s actually quite terrifying and certainly something that we need to all kind of keep an eye out for as a community.”
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