"The morning of June 3, 2003 started out like any other for 20-year-old Maria Hernandez. She ate breakfast with her three-year-old daughter Michaela then proceeded to do a morning grocery run at the nearby market, not far from her modest home in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. She said she'd be back for lunch. But midday came, and Maria's chair sat empty.The Hernandez's frantically searched for Maria, but their efforts proved futile as no trace of her could be found. A few days later, an anonymous witness revealed that he had seen a black car pull up to Maria two blocks away and proceeded to wrestle her, struggling, into the backseat."

Maria's tragic disappearance is not at all uncommon in Honduras, where poverty and weak internal infrastructure creates illegal trades such as human-trafficking. Honduras' sex trade has grown in recent years since the country's progressive financial meltdown over decades torn by internal conflicts, civil war, and border disputes. According to the United States Department of State,"10,000 victims have been trafficked in Honduras, mostly internally [and] many victims are children subject to commercial sexual exploitation"(U.S. Department of State 2007 Trafficking in Persons Report - Honduras 2).

Thank you for visiting this page!

We are a group of Irvington Highschool Students aiming to make a difference in our Sophmore year benchmark project.

Through Casa Alianza we are hoping to raise awareness as well as fund for shelters in Honduras.

So why Honduras?


"an estimated 118,800 women and girls in Latin America and the Carribean and 1.3 million worldwide"(U.S. Department of State 2007 Trafficking in Persons Report - Honduras 3)



Honduras is currently a mixture of "Extreme poverty, chronic unemployment and a serious crime wave fueled by gangs known as 'maras"(An International Charity Dedicated to Street Children 5)



"the traffickers put the children in apartments, help them file refugee claims and sign up for welfare. In return, the children are turned out on the street as indentured drug dealers." (Adrienne Turner, "Drug ring lures kids as dealers: Hondurans as young as 11 deal crack in Vancouver," Ottawa Citizen, 20 July 1998)



"Honduran girls, 13 and 14 year olds, were trafficked by organized crime groups in central America from the cities of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula and El Progreso under false pretenses, such as job offerings and scholarships and sold to brothels in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Mexico". (Interpol, "More Honduran Girls Prostituted," Reuters, 28 February 1998)


"Honduras has been the site of sex tourism, pedophilia, and trafficking by Americans and Australians".  (Casa Alianza/Covenant House Latin America, "Casa Alianza Warns That Central America is New Sex Tourism Destination," 17 November 1997)



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