Still Grace Remains: Human Trafficking Tattoo Removal Brings New Life for Victims

Fighting Against the Stigma of Tattoos

Six years ago, Rob Beattie befriended a rescuing agent in LA who helped people escape human trafficking. She told him how traffickers use tattooing to brand their captives.

“I couldn’t set it aside,” he says. “It really hung onto my heart.”

Rob himself is covered in body art. At age 17, he got his first two tattoos—crosses on the inside of both his forearms—at the same time. To him, tattooing is a deeply personal form of art, and he felt appalled at the idea of survivors having to bear the scars of their traumatic history.

Still Grace Remains Founder Rob Beattie

While getting a tattoo in LA, Rob asked his close friend and artist what he would charge to do a cover-up for a Survivor of human trafficking. His friend told him he wouldn’t take a cent—and he’d shut the shop down to give the Survivor total privacy. Another artist friend said he’d do the same thing.

The rescue agent connected him with a young woman who had been tattooed on her neck with her trafficker’s gang name. The artists covered it up with a beautiful floral design.

He thought it was a one-time thing. But with the massive demand—and the support to meet it—he couldn’t stop there. And so Still Grace Remains was born—a nonprofit that provides aftercare for survivors of sex trafficking in the form of tattoo cover-up and laser tattoo removal.

The insidious use of branding tattoos in human trafficking

Traffickers use tattoos to mark ownership over their victims and dehumanize them, so they’ll view themselves as property. Common types of branding tattoos include bar codes, symbols representing the trafficker and his gang affiliation, and even dollar signs with the amount of money a victim was sold for. “This is a horrific practice because it forces the survivor to associate themselves with a number and place their value there,” Rob says. Images depicting chains and bondage are also common.

The nonprofit has even seen portraits, faces, and names of the victim’s trafficker—overtly labeling the victim as another person’s property.

“The tattoo, the brand, is sometimes an afterthought, but it can actually be the most detrimental part because it’s such a reminder,” Rob asserts.

Branding tattoos can be found anywhere on the survivor’s body, though they’re often located in very prominent places, like the face or neck. One report had dollar signs surrounding the female’s private parts, while another had these markings on her chest. In one of the more challenging removals, the trafficker’s name had been written above the survivor’s left eyebrow. Because she drove other victims around, he wanted other traffickers to know who she “belonged” to. “It’s meant to take someone away from who they really are,” Rob explains.

Removing Survivor’s Ink: How Tattoo Removal Changes the Lives of Human Trafficking Victims

Erasing or covering survivors’ branding tattoos erases the constant reminder of their abuse while removing barriers to entering school or the professional realm. Even though the world is growing much more accepting of tattoos in general, having tattoos in places like the face, neck, or hands can bring a lot of stigmas, Rob notes. “The trauma faced by these survivors is unfathomable,” laments Rob.

Photo Credit: Kat Jayne

The truth about human trafficking

Human trafficking usually doesn’t look like what people think, Rob asserts. It doesn’t typically begin with a stranger snatching a person in a parking lot, or with a container ship of victims from overseas. More often, it’s someone the victim is close to—or even a family member.

Trafficking can also exploit people for their labor, although sex trafficking is more common.

Where it happens

“This stuff is happening right here in America,” says Rob. It affects boys and girls, men and women, and it happens in cities across the U.S. and globally, to people of every race, in every type of neighborhood—yet many of us don’t realize that it affects people in our own community.

People often misjudge the woman standing on the corner and believe she’s a drug addict who is selling her body to support her addiction, Rob notes. They dismiss her as a junkie, but they don’t consider that she might have been forced into that situation by someone she knows.

There’s also a false narrative that pimps protect sex workers, he says, when in actuality, these pimps are trafficking them.

“The reality of trafficking is that it’s in your city, and in your neighborhood,” – Rob Beattie

How it begins

There are many “on-ramps” to exploitation by traffickers, Rob explains. Often, the victims are having a difficult time and feeling disconnected from society. “Traffickers are very good at sniffing out people who are vulnerable,” he emphasizes. They prey on runaways and people with a history of childhood trauma. They look for kids and teens who are hanging out in the streets late at night. To survive, these victims often find themselves doing things they never thought they’d consider.

Recruitment Tactics of Sex TraffickingIn the U.S., young girls are the primary target. Often, an older man promises them a better life, and because many of them had an absentee father, they’re easily manipulated. The trafficker usually works to win the victim’s confidence over time if he’s not close to her already. “It’s not an overnight thing,” Rob asserts. “It’s a grooming process where they trust and oftentimes love their actual trafficker.” After the trafficker wins the victim’s trust, he begins asking her to spend time with one or two different men, which builds up to being raped 10–40 times a day by many different consumers.

Partnership with The Removery

Still Grace Remains began working with The Removery around the beginning of the pandemic. Rob spoke with the manager at their downtown location, then talked with the founder about a potential partnership. They both felt thrilled about the idea.

Completely erasing a tattoo rather than covering it up is ideal, Rob emphasizes. Often, the survivor would not have chosen to get a tattoo in the spot the abuser chose and simply wants it to be gone—especially because the rising trend in trafficking to is brand on the neck and faces of victims. Completely erasing the tattoo affirms the survivor’s autonomy and personhood. Because of the rise of human trafficking, these tattoos are becoming more and more common, meaning SGR needed a way to remove them completely, says Rob. The partnership with The Removery helped make that possible.

Rob has seen moving success stories from tattoo removal in the past. One survivor in California had been tattooed down her jawline, and SGR arranged for a private contractor to laser-remove it. An incredibly strong person, she’s now working on finishing her counseling degree so she can help others recover from abusive situations.

The woman whose trafficker’s name was written above her eyebrow is undergoing laser removal, and she’s working to help other survivors start a new life.

Currently, Say Grace Remains works primarily in America while beginning operations in Australia and the UK, but have their eyes set towards establishing a global reach, says Rob. They have a network of artists across the globe who are excited to assist in these efforts.

How can people help?

Becoming a regular SGR donor who gives a little as $5 or $10 a month to support survivors can change people’s future, says Rob. Taking time to tell people what human trafficking really looks like can also make a difference, both in person and on social media. “The eye can’t see what the eye doesn’t know,” he emphasizes. “A lot of the time, people will step over something that they don’t understand, because they don’t understand it.”

You can also help by volunteering with SGR or a local organization.

We can also help change the culture that allows human trafficking to persist through the choices we make, says Rob. For instance, we can steer clear of products that rely on forced labor, using apps that show whether they were produced ethically. Rob speaks to men about the exploitation that persists in the hardcore pornography industry, as many women who appear in these films are there under duress. Through a massive culture shift, Rob believes we can eradicate the demand for human trafficking—but it will take all of us to do it.

Sources

NAPNAP Partners for Vulnerable Youth, “Tattoos of Human Trafficking Victims”

The Polaris Project, “Myths, Facts, and Statistics”

WBIR, “Here’s What Human Trafficking Actually Looks Like and How to Spot, Stop It”