the joker
oatmeal raisin lover
http://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/features/a63560/marijuana-industry-sexual-abuse-rape/
The trees towered above them, limbs etched in black against the night sky. He steered his pickup down a narrow path of mud and rocks, and parked in front of a trailer. He tried to kiss her. Terri* froze.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"I have to get up early," she said.
He began groping her body.
"Don’t you have a wife?"
The woods seemed to crawl with creatures; the ground was slick with rain. As wilderness pulsed around them, she ran through the possibilities.
If she fled, would she find her way out? If she fought back, would he hurt her?
Would anyone hear her if she screamed?
In the Emerald Triangle, trees are ever present. They peek over small towns and dip into valleys, sheathing the three remote Northern California counties that make up the Triangle — Humboldt, Trinity, and Mendocino — in silence. Here, farmers tend to the nation’s largest, albeit largely underground, marijuana-growing industry. Last year, legal California sales alone were valued at $2.7 billion, according to The ArcView Group, a marijuana market research firm. Sales are projected to balloon to $6.4 billion by 2020 if marijuana is legalized for recreational use. Legal or not, it’s big business, drawing busloads of job seekers.
During the June-to-November harvest, thousands of workers called "trimmigrants" pour into the Triangle for coveted jobs trimming marijuana buds. They are college students and artists, hippies and worldly wanderers. At the top levels, growing is a male-dominated field, and growers often prefer to hire female trimmers because they’re supposedly more dexterous and thus more efficient workers. But over the past five years, young women have begun emerging from the woods with tales of being forced to give their bosses blow jobs to get paid or asked to trim topless for wage increases. The hidden nature of the industry has led to an epidemic of sexual abuse that’s rarely reported or investigated.
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During months reporting in the region, Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting unearthed dozens of accounts of sexual exploitation and trafficking on marijuana farms. Victims’ advocates say the problem is far larger and, with every harvest, continues to grow. Yet law enforcement is not really addressing the problem. Instead officers focus on what they view as the root cause: the drug trade.
"Women believe they are getting hired for trimming work, and then they’re drugged and raped," said Maryann Hayes Mariani, a coordinator for the North Coast Rape Crisis Team. "Everybody looks at (the region) like it’s the Land of Oz. I’m just so tired of pretending like it’s not happening here."
The number of trimmigrants who go missing alone is overwhelming. In 2015, Humboldt County reported 352 missing people, more per capita than any other county in the state. Looking deeper into some of the missing reports reveals a more complex story.
When an artist from San Francisco disappeared in the Humboldt County town of Garberville last harvest season, her mother and roommate filed a missing persons report. Months later, she resurfaced to tell her family she had been held against her will on a marijuana farm, drugged, and sexually abused. She never formally reported her abuse.
But at the time of her disappearance, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office had labeled her a "voluntary missing adult." They flagged the case as a low priority.
"Many people come to Humboldt each year to work on the marijuana farms," the deputy who took the report told her roommate in an email. "So far she is falling into the same category as many others have."
Of course, many marijuana farms are responsible operations. Most workers describe good experiences, including excellent pay, food, and shelter. Many also welcome the unusual working conditions of an industry long at odds with mainstream culture and the law. Drug use on the job, for instance, is common.
In November, California voters will decide whether to fully legalize recreational marijuana. But such use remains illegal under federal and most state laws, and the culture of silence is so embedded in the state’s industry — the nation’s top black market supplier — it seems unlikely that legalization alone will dramatically alter the landscape for women toiling deep in the Emerald Triangle.
"There’s a lot of wilderness here. There’s a lot of nooks and crannies you can hide in," said Amy Benitez, a victims’ advocate in Humboldt County. "You add this criminal element to it, where there’s money, and there’s just more ways that you can abuse power and control."
The trees towered above them, limbs etched in black against the night sky. He steered his pickup down a narrow path of mud and rocks, and parked in front of a trailer. He tried to kiss her. Terri* froze.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"I have to get up early," she said.
He began groping her body.
"Don’t you have a wife?"
The woods seemed to crawl with creatures; the ground was slick with rain. As wilderness pulsed around them, she ran through the possibilities.
If she fled, would she find her way out? If she fought back, would he hurt her?
Would anyone hear her if she screamed?
In the Emerald Triangle, trees are ever present. They peek over small towns and dip into valleys, sheathing the three remote Northern California counties that make up the Triangle — Humboldt, Trinity, and Mendocino — in silence. Here, farmers tend to the nation’s largest, albeit largely underground, marijuana-growing industry. Last year, legal California sales alone were valued at $2.7 billion, according to The ArcView Group, a marijuana market research firm. Sales are projected to balloon to $6.4 billion by 2020 if marijuana is legalized for recreational use. Legal or not, it’s big business, drawing busloads of job seekers.
During the June-to-November harvest, thousands of workers called "trimmigrants" pour into the Triangle for coveted jobs trimming marijuana buds. They are college students and artists, hippies and worldly wanderers. At the top levels, growing is a male-dominated field, and growers often prefer to hire female trimmers because they’re supposedly more dexterous and thus more efficient workers. But over the past five years, young women have begun emerging from the woods with tales of being forced to give their bosses blow jobs to get paid or asked to trim topless for wage increases. The hidden nature of the industry has led to an epidemic of sexual abuse that’s rarely reported or investigated.
ADVERTISEMENT - CONTINUE READING BELOW
During months reporting in the region, Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting unearthed dozens of accounts of sexual exploitation and trafficking on marijuana farms. Victims’ advocates say the problem is far larger and, with every harvest, continues to grow. Yet law enforcement is not really addressing the problem. Instead officers focus on what they view as the root cause: the drug trade.
"Women believe they are getting hired for trimming work, and then they’re drugged and raped," said Maryann Hayes Mariani, a coordinator for the North Coast Rape Crisis Team. "Everybody looks at (the region) like it’s the Land of Oz. I’m just so tired of pretending like it’s not happening here."
The number of trimmigrants who go missing alone is overwhelming. In 2015, Humboldt County reported 352 missing people, more per capita than any other county in the state. Looking deeper into some of the missing reports reveals a more complex story.
When an artist from San Francisco disappeared in the Humboldt County town of Garberville last harvest season, her mother and roommate filed a missing persons report. Months later, she resurfaced to tell her family she had been held against her will on a marijuana farm, drugged, and sexually abused. She never formally reported her abuse.
But at the time of her disappearance, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office had labeled her a "voluntary missing adult." They flagged the case as a low priority.
"Many people come to Humboldt each year to work on the marijuana farms," the deputy who took the report told her roommate in an email. "So far she is falling into the same category as many others have."
Of course, many marijuana farms are responsible operations. Most workers describe good experiences, including excellent pay, food, and shelter. Many also welcome the unusual working conditions of an industry long at odds with mainstream culture and the law. Drug use on the job, for instance, is common.
In November, California voters will decide whether to fully legalize recreational marijuana. But such use remains illegal under federal and most state laws, and the culture of silence is so embedded in the state’s industry — the nation’s top black market supplier — it seems unlikely that legalization alone will dramatically alter the landscape for women toiling deep in the Emerald Triangle.
"There’s a lot of wilderness here. There’s a lot of nooks and crannies you can hide in," said Amy Benitez, a victims’ advocate in Humboldt County. "You add this criminal element to it, where there’s money, and there’s just more ways that you can abuse power and control."