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The Global Fight Against Human Trafficking: One Student's Experience

When the country's top official in the struggle against human trafficking needed an intern last fall, he knew exactly whom to ask: Professor Bridgette Carr, '02.

Ambassador Luis CdeBaca, '93Ambassador Luis CdeBaca, '93, who directs the State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, knows Carr from her involvement in the defense of human trafficking victims and her prominent role in the battle against modern-day slavery. Carr found a student in her clinic who was impassioned about the issue, and who could make arrangements to leave campus for a semester in her 3L year.

That student, Jane Khodarkovsky, provided interpretations of human trafficking laws in the United States and around the world for CdeBaca's office. She worked on revising laws around the world that the office had found to be insufficient.

"It was an amazing experience," says Khodarkovsky. "I was able to help draft two laws, one that was passed in Malaysia and one that is currently being looked at by the government of Bangladesh."

She also has made her mark as a student in the Human Trafficking Clinic. She worked with clients in the hair-braiding case (see main story), helping one to get a Green Card and another to secure her mother's passage to the United States because she was no longer safe in her home country.

"Those are the moments when you know, okay, staying up until one in the morning revising this one sentence was worth it," she says.

Both experiences have built a strong foundation for her first post–law school job: clerking for New Jersey Judge Ronald Wigler, who previously was a federal prosecutor on a major human trafficking case in New Jersey.—KV

More information about the Human Trafficking Clinic...

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