Street Grace working to eradicate commercial sexual exploitation of children

ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) - Each month, Atlanta News First donates to an organization serving the community as part of our Three Degree Guarantee program.

The amount of money we donate depends on the accuracy of our First Alert Weather Team. The donation is then matched by our partners at Coolray. This month, we are highlighting the work of Street Grace, a nonprofit organization.

“We have gone from a local presence, to have a lot of influence in Georgia legislation to having a national voice on human trafficking legislation,” Brooke Ruffin, Street Grace vice president and executive director, said.

Street Grace has spent 15 years working to eradicate the commercial sexual exploitation of children — one policy at a time.

“Today, we’ve disrupted over 38,000 transactions of those seeking to exploit individuals online,” Ruffin said.

Ruffin said every year, children across the U.S. are sexually exploited for commercial gain.

But since 2008, Street Grace has been in an arms race against crime, constantly developing new strategies to stay ahead.

“The tactics of those seeking to exploit our children are always changing,” Ruffin said. “They have all of the resources at hand to them. So we are changing our prevention measures as we have to meet children where they are, on the same apps as they are and educating parents on whatever new app they are using.”

Faythe Kadona witnesses those tactics firsthand.

As the subject matter expert at Street Grace, Kadona works one on one with at risk youth.

She said the first tool is educating.

“One of the biggest challenges, people have a misconception about what sex trafficking really is. They still think sometimes its zip ties on a car, the white van, someone following you around in Target, or Walmart,” Kadona said. “That’s just not really what traffickers do. Traffickers are very hidden, they don’t like to be seen or noticed because they don’t want to get arrested. So those misconceptions lead to less victim identification.”

Street grace is guided by four pillars: prevention, protection, policy and pursuit. All in which Ruffin said has kept the organization impactful in Georgia and beyond.

“So, it’s been wonderful to see the footprint grow and the amount of individuals served increase,” Ruffin said.