Comprehensive Training and Technical Assistance Project to strengthen the capacity of legal service providers to serve victims of all forms of trafficking in persons

Human trafficking victims have complex legal needs but due to a lack in identification, many cannot access the full spectrum of legal relief available to them.  Even when victims are identified, the demand for legal services outpaces the number of legal providers in the country who are adequately trained in trauma-informed and racially equitable services.  As a result, legal services are an unmet need of trafficking victims and compressed training on the legal needs of and ethical provision services to trafficking victims is in high demand. 

Through its expert legal and social services staff, the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking (Cast) proposes to continue its comprehensive, national, accessible and inclusive training and technical assistance (TTA) project to strengthen legal service providers’, pro bono attorneys’, and social service providers’ capacity to identify and provide comprehensive legal services to victims of human trafficking through a trauma-informed and race equity lens. In partnership with the Office for Victims of Crime, Cast will build on over 15 years of providing TTA to deepen and expand its national TTA efforts to increase trafficking victims’ access to quality comprehensive legal services.  Additionally, Cast will leverage collaboration with many national partners like Freedom Network USA’s Survivor Reentry Project to provide comprehensive TTA.

The project will provide comprehensive live and on-demand training to legal and social service providers including Anti-Trafficking Lawyering Training Module 2, Intensive T Visa Declaration Workshops, and Victims’ Rights Advocacy for Social Service Providers, as well as self-paced online training to many more attorneys and social service providers nationally through an advanced Learning Management System for asynchronous and synchronous learning. Cast will also continue to provide individual technical assistance to 40 legal and social service professionals a month, as well as weekly legal working group calls and monthly office hours for social service providers. Cast will subgrant to Freedom Network USA to support TTA on criminal record relief, and to the National Crime Victims Law Institute who will support TTA on crime victims’ rights. While targeted beneficiaries are legal and social service providers, anyone interested in increasing knowledge in this area will be able to access the Cast TTA website for materials on popular topics.

Through this project, Cast will have the opportunity to continue to transform the landscape of trained legal service providers assisting victims of human trafficking and to vastly improve victims’ lives.