FBI on lookout for alleged human trafficking ringleader

KHOU reports today that the FBI is on the lookout for Gerardo "El Gallo" Salazar, the alleged ringleader of a human trafficiking group responsible for kidnapping young women and forcing them into prostitution in several locations across Houston. Five men have already been convicted in the case, but Salazar, the sixth, went on the run — and officials believe he might come back to Houston, if he isn't here already. “The human trafficking business is a very profitable one, so yes, we think and we believe he is going to come back,” FBI Special Agent Maritza Conde told Channel 11.

Human trafficiking is a worldwide problem, with victims essentially ending up as slaves, forced to beg, work or prostitute themselves. In the case of Salazar and his group, the men would lure girls from Mexico to the United States with promises of love and a better life, Conde said: "Our main guy and the other subjects were romancing these girls telling them, ‘I am going to take care of you. I am going to build you a house’, selling them the American dream,” she said. But when they got to Houston, the girls found a different reality:

“These traffickers are telling their victims basically, ‘You need to do as I say or I will kill your parents, I will kill your children’. Brutal beatings, humiliations, and most people that are being trafficked are foreign nationals so they have the language barriers as well,” said Conde.

The issue, of course, is that there's no one to help the women. In some cases, they're faced with threats like the girls in Houston were; sometimes they're drugged or beaten as well. And often, no one knows the women exist — like the group the FBI found in a secret room inside a Houston-area cantina. “They have no place to go. They have nobody to talk to. They trust nobody,” Conde said.

The five men who have been convicted in the trafficking scheme are awaiting sentencing as the FBI continues looking for Salazar. If you want to learn more about human trafficking and find out what you can do to help, check out humantrafficking.org.