Slavery at your door

Cover story | Human trafficking in the United States preys on often helpless victims in surprisingly bucolic settings | Jamie Dean

HIGH POINT, N.C.— On a sleepy street corner in the small town of High Point, N.C., customers shuffle into the Oak Hollow Thrift Store, sifting through used household items and secondhand clothes in a town best known for its furniture manufacturing. Next door, in a small, windowless office, Mark Kadel talks about a lesser-known commodity traded in the Southeast: human lives.

Kadel is director of the High Point affiliate of World Relief, a Christian relief organization that offers aid to victims of human trafficking worldwide. The U.S. Department of State says human trafficking is the fastest-growing criminal industry in the world and estimates that some 15,000 to 18,000 people in the United States fall victim to modern-day slavery each year.