In 2013 our founder, Detective Bill Woolf, had just recovered a seventeen-year-old victim of human trafficking. For three years, Emily was subjected to countless sexual assaults arranged by her trafficker, the man whom she believed to be her boyfriend. With an intact and loving family, Emily did not fit the typical picture many people associate with trafficking—a child abandoned, homeless, desperate. Yet her grades slipped, her behavior changed, and eventually counselors, school officials, and even the courts got involved. Despite it all, Emily did not get the help she needed and the abuse continued. When Bill asked where the system had failed, she simply said, “No one ever asked.”

These words are what propelled Bill to form the precursor to Anti-Trafficking International (ATI). Aptly named the Just Ask Prevention Project, Bill brought law enforcement, schools, and other partners together to train professionals on identifying trafficking victims and develop our Just Ask Prevention Curriculum for students. Communities in the U.S. and abroad craved more.  What began as an awareness campaign has grown into a flourishing 501(c)(3) global foundation now known as ATI. Today, we partner with students, parents, and professionals like you to empower everyone to abolish human trafficking right from where they are. A community trained in education, prevention, and intervention will no longer let children like Emily be coerced and trapped for years in a situation like hers. Instead, our children will be surrounded by support systems at every level to stop human trafficking before it starts.