INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A black market epidemic that is secretly planting its roots in Indiana.

Experts are giving a glimpse into what the reality of human trafficking looks like and how it is affecting Hoosiers.

Human trafficking is happening right in front of us every day but often goes unnoticed. To someone who is not familiar with the signs of human trafficking, a victim could be mistaken for a prostitute or a runaway.

“The longer you experience trafficking the more likely you are to be criminalized and have a criminal record,” said Kate Kimmer, anti-trafficking coordinator for Indiana Coalition to End Sexual Assault and Trafficking. “Public defenders and prosecutors should be working together to put away traffickers not arrest victims.”

That common misconception of sex trafficking seen in movies is what has allowed this growing black market to continue to trap women and men into what many professionals refer to as modern day slavery and it happening right here on our streets.

“Human trafficking is frankly a lot more prolific than people believe it is in Central Indiana and across the state,” Kimmer said.

Every day, the ICESAT gets more victims calling in reporting trafficking, but trafficking is not just sexual many victims are also sold into labor trafficking.

Sex Trafficking: The recruiting, harboring, transportation, provision, obtaining, patronizing, or soliciting of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act in which the commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud or coercion or in which the person induced to perform such an act is under 18 years old.

Labor Trafficking: The recruiting, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services, through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage, or slavery.

“The most common victims are females, age 13 to 15 and sometimes earlier or later teen years,” said Indiana State Police Sergeant John Perrine

“People who are vulnerable, usually because they are not having their most basic needs met. Whether that is safe and stable housing or a loving home, food, basic needs than any human would need to survive,” said Kimmer.

Due to of the nature of human trafficking it’s difficult, if not impossible for victims to accept help. The trafficker has often convinced them that no one will believe them and has scared them away from trying to reach out.

Experts say often someone who is a victim of sex trafficking has previously attempted to tell people that they have experienced violence, but they have either not been believed, not been supported, or have been blamed.This can make them unwilling to come forward and begin to believe their trafficker when they say, ‘they won’t believe you.’

“What traffickers do is fairly simple to be frank with you, they prey on folks who need something and they provide some of those basic needs in exchange for an extremely abusive, violent, and exploitative experience,” said Kimmer.

The idea of a dramatic kidnapping where a victim is taken out of the country is not the common nature of human trafficking though those cases do happen.

“Parts of the state that we are seeing the most impacted are Central Indiana, East Central Indiana, Anderson and Muncie area, Fort Wayne area, Lake County area, Vanderburgh County area, and then Jeffersonville,” said Kimmer.

She says that those areas are also well trained, in comparison to other areas, in identifying human trafficking.

“They will build that trust, they will build that friendship and then they’ll turn into the sex trafficking situation,” said Perrine.

Kimmer says a helpful tool to get a head of this epidemic is if schools could have the conversation, with at risk youth especially, early.

“25 percent of our kids are going to be sexually abused before they get out of school and we are not even having a conversation about sexual abuse, healthy boundaries, about consent, about their sexual rights, that is unacceptable to me,” said Kimmer.

Currently the state of Indiana doesn’t have any designated funding for human trafficking resources. This is causing issues for treatment facilities because they have to further stretch resources that are already too thin and that are designated for a different population of people.

They say the lack of resources makes them unable to provide the long term care that is needed for victims of human trafficking. Kimmer said there is a lack in planning for emergency, short term, mid term, and long term planning resources for human trafficking victims.

Kimmer feels first responders and teachers need to be provided training to be able to identify the less obvious signs of sex trafficking.

If you suspect any type of trafficking activity you should call 9-1-1 immediately.

For human trafficking resources and more information on red flags you can refer to ICESAT’s website.