Leslie King was a victim of human trafficking and was made to conduct crimes, WDIV reported.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, has pardoned a 58-year-old woman who served time for crimes she committed as a victim of human trafficking. It’s a tale of second chances for her — but not many share the same fate.
According to King’s lawyer, she might be the first victim of human trafficking to be granted a pardon by the governor.
Her experience is significant because many victims of human trafficking have been accused of crimes they were compelled to conduct while they were being trafficked.
King claimed that after learning of her pardon, “all I could do was scream … and fall to my knees,” she said in the article.
At age 15, Leslie King was coerced into working as a human trafficker.
King claimed that she was forced into human trafficking at the age of 15, when her crimes first started. She was taken in by a man who initially showed her love and generosity.
“Every day he would come and pick me up and then he would take me shopping and then he started taking me to the bars and telling me how much he loved me. So he started working on my insecurities that I didn’t know I had,” King said in the article.
She served several years in jail. At the age of 36, she was finally able to begin to rebuild her life, insofar as she could given her criminal record.
“I was going to school for social work but I didn’t go back because I was told that because of my record I wouldn’t be able to get a license and that kind of — instead of me going forward with it, I just got really frustrated,” King said in the article.
Call the National Human Trafficking Resource Center at 888-373-7888 or text the number 233733 if you area human trafficking victim in need of help or know someone who does.
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