Fact Check: Were the 39 Rescued Children in Georgia Found in a Trailer?

Over the weekend, U.S. Marshals were able to rescue 39 children and arrested nine people in a mission to stop sex trafficking rings in Georgia.

However, people are asking why the media did not cover the part when then authorities found the children inside a double-wide trailer, just like what a viral Facebook post claims.

The truth

The reason why the media did not include the story about the authorities finding the children inside a trailer is because it did not happen that way.

U.S. Marshals announced that they rescued 39 children all in all in a 2-week operation that they dubbed "Operation Not Forgotten." Those children were found in different locations across the state, and they are not inside a trailer together. That means the Facebook post is false.

While this type of development is a big deal, the discrepancy may explain why it was not the lead story on the national news.

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The rescued children were considered to be some of the most at-risk and challenging recovery cases in Georgia based on indications of high-risk factors such as child exploitation, child sex trafficking, physical abuse, sexual abuse, and medical or mental health conditions.

The youngest child that was rescued was reportedly three years old, and while many had been gone of several weeks, one child was missing for two years before being rescued, according to WXYZ.

Authorities arrested nine people, many of whom already had multiple arrest warrants for charges including parental kidnapping, sex trafficking, registered sex offender violations, weapons possession, and drugs.

Sex trafficking bust

The U.S. Marshals Service Missing Child Unit led the search. The unit collaborated with the agency's Southeast Regional Fugitive Task Force, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, and state and local agencies. The operation resulted in the rescue of 39 children.

U.S. Marshals Service Director Donald Washington said in a statement that the U.S. Marshals Service is fully committed to assisting federal, state, and local agencies with locating and recovering endangered missing children. This is in addition to the agency's main fugitive apprehension mission.

Washington also said that the U.S. Marshals would never stop looking for missing children in the country, and they will launch operations in every state.

In 2019, an operation was held in New Orleans that resulted in the arrest of five people that were accused of sex trafficking girls. The suspects pimped them out and seared them with tattoos, as reported by Fox News.

One of the victims, aged 16, was recovered from a hotel having been beaten, raped, and drugged by several male perpetrators. Another victim, aged 17, was also rescued after having been repeatedly pimped out.

One of the suspects, Darnell Johnson, aged 26, was charged with two counts of tattooing a minor and one count of contributing to the delinquency of minors.

The other suspects arrested were Jayson Figueroa and Cordarrell Rudolph; both are facing charges of trafficking children for sexual purposes, second-degree rape, and felony carnal knowledge of a juvenile.

Another suspect, Kortlen Hubbard, was arrested after confessing to having had oral sex with the 16-year-old girl.

According to the FBI, every 40 seconds a child goes missing in the United States, accounting for 765,000 missing children a year. Since U.S. Marshals partnered with NCMEC in 2005, the agency has recovered more than 1,800 missing children.