The Missing Americans Project

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JESSICA (Jessie) EDITH LOUISE FOSTER, international endangered missing woman and victim of human trafficking BY Jessie's mom, Glendene Grant . . . part 2

. . . CONTINUED FROM PART 1 


 

Some of the media from 2010 and 2011: 

 

1 – TITLE

2 – INTRODUCTION

3 – RCMP & CRIME STOPPERS BLUE BLINDFOLD CAMPAIGN ANNOUNCEMENT

4 – MP JOY SMITH's BLUE BLINDFOLD CAMPAIGN ANNOUNCEMENT

5 – SEVEN HUMAN TRAFFICKING ARTICLES by JEREMY DEUTSCH of K.T.W.

6 – M.A.T.H. MOTHERS AGAINST TRAFFICKING HUMANS

7 – BOOKS OUT or COMING OUT WITH JESSIE's CASE MENTIONED

8 – ADDITIONAL INFO ON MEDIA, ETC

 

1 – TITLE: Missing Jessie Foster & Human Trafficking Information in 2010 

Put together by Jessie's mom Glendene - Released September 10, 2010

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2 – INTRODUCTION: HUMAN TRAFFICKING 

Finally it is not just known as a 3rd world country or crime television thing anymore. I have become friends and allies with people in Canada, the USA, the UK, Spain, South Africa who are all now more aware of human trafficking than ever before because of Jessie's case and all the work I have been doing in her name.

 

There was so much in just 2010 alone: 

 

• February 15, 2010 I was honoured to be invited to be a guest speaker at the 19thAnnual Women's Memorial March in Vancouver, BC. I was not sure I would be able to make it, due to financial difficulties, but thanks to many generous Jessie supporters all over (from Canada, the USA, Portugal and England) I was able to attend. Besides being a guest speaker, during the march I was able to have the glorified honour of drumming. It is a very spiritual thing, and there were several times during the march, that there were several eagles flying high above us. It was amazing, but it was not surprising, To the First Nations People there is nothing surprising about those who have gone before, their ancestors . . . their family and their friends . . . them to be with them at a time like that, too give them strength and love. It was very amazing to me to feel as I did there. While I was there I met some people who were filming a documentary with one of Robert 'Willie' Pickton's (a notorious Canadian serial killer) victim's daughter, and during their filming, they did a portion on Jessie. Also there was a documentary being filmed called "In the Shadow of the Olympic Flame: A Report from the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, the Poorest Neighbourhood in Canada" (http://www.democracynow.org/2010/3/2/in_the_shadow_of_the_olympic) in which I was able to show Jessie's missing poster and mention her case. 

March 6, 2010 I was contacted by a woman named Timea Nagy, the founder of a human trafficking organization called Walk-With-Me (http://www.wix.com/timea77/walk-with-me). Timea was also the victim of human trafficking, but she has long become a survivor of this horrific crime. Timea had heard of Jessie's case the previous October when she was in Calgary. She was there to do a human trafficking training session with the Calgary police and it just so happened that there was a 3-day series that Canoe News was doing about missing Canadian women and Jessie's case was on the front page of the Calgary (AB) Herald newspaper, again. Timea was talking to a police officer and he asked her if she had ever heard of Jessie Foster, the Calgary woman who was a human trafficking victim. Timea had not, but she took the paper and for months after that she could not get Jessie out of her mind. Then she was planning her ceremony to award people who have worked with victims of human trafficking, trying hard to make a dent in this horrific crime. But she did not have a name for her award and she again thought about Jessie and she called me. Timea wanted to know if she could name the award the Glendene & Jessie Foster Award to honour Jessie as a victim and me as the mother of a human trafficking victim who works to raise awareness. I was so pleased. I had long said that Jessie was going to be the Poster Child for human trafficking in Canada and this was definitely going to help. Jessie is the most well-known human trafficking victim in Western Canada, if not the most well-known human trafficking victim in all of Canada.

• March 17 & 19, 2010 were parts one and two of a four-part series in my local Kamloops This Week newspaper called: MODERN-DAY SLAVERY.

• March 23, 2010, Canada's only accredited forensic artist and now a dear friend of mine, Diana Trepkov offered to do an age-enhancement drawing of Jessie as a gift from one mother to the other, as she put it. I was thrilled, and when she ended up doing 3 of them, I could not thank her enough. Then another Jessie supporter, a man who had been through his own daughter's disappearance and murder years earlier, someone who had been there for us since we first realized Jessie was missing wanted to pay Diana her fee to do a 4th drawing of Jessie as she would look, 4 years after being a human trafficking victim. After these drawings were complete, he and I worked on a news release to come out on March 29, 2010, the 4th year of Jessie's disappearance.

• March 24 & 26, 2010 were parts three and four of a four-part series in my local Kamloops This Week newspaper called: MODERN-DAY SLAVERY.

• March 29, 2010 I was in Vancouver, BC on the CTV Canada AM TV show. Diana Trepkov talked to her contact there and they wanted to have her and me on their show at the same time, on March 29, 2010. So I went to Vancouver and Diana went to Toronto and we were on the show 'together' even though we were half-way across the country from each other.

• April 15, 2010, again thanks to the generosity of so many others, I was in Toronto, Ontario, for the First Annual Glendene & Jessie Foster Award Ceremony. I was flown there on WestJet thanks to Louis McIvor donating buddy tickets, getting me plane tickets from Kamloops to Toronto for just $70.00 each and I stayed at the Toronto Sandman Signature Hotel for 2 nights and 3 days in their Penthouse Suite (I would have been happy with a bed and a shower, but there was a hot-tub and everything in this mansion) with everything included. Meals, taxes, anything I needed . . . even bottled water, but I did not know that until I checked out and I found out I owned NOTHING! I got to see Jessie's stepsister Alisha and her 3 children and I got to meet the most incredible people who were all being honoured with a Jessie Award. 

 

People like:

Timea Nagy (http://www.walk-with-me.org) herself, she is such a wonderful person and exactly like she was on the phone and in emails and people like the recipients of the Jessie award (listed below): 

 

Law Enforcement

Armand P. La Barge: Chief of Police York Region (now their former Chief)

York Regional Police: Drugs and Vice Unit 

Peel Regional Police: Drugs and Vice Unit

RCMP: Human Trafficking National Coordination Centre, Ottawa

RCMP: Immigration and Passport Section, Hamilton-Niagara Regional Detachment

RCMP: Human Trafficking Coordination Centre, Awareness Coordinator, Toronto, Ontario

Toronto Police Services: Sex Crimes Unit

Toronto Police Services: 22 Division

Edmonton Police: Vice Section, G. John Fiorilli, Edmonton, Alberta

Channa Guenoun: Canada Border Services Agency

Crime Stoppers York Region: Sergeant Gary Harvey, Police coordinator

Toronto Police Services: 52 Division, Sergeant Michael Josifovic 

 

Non-Government Agencies

FCJ Refugee Centre: Loly Rico, Co-Director, Toronto, Ontario

Human Trafficking Coalition Windsor: Shelly Gilbert staff Lawyer, and her team

Professor Benjamin Perrin & MAYTREE Foundation: Toronto, Ontario

Salvation Army Branford: Doug Radmore, Front line worker

Salvation Army Hamilton: Amy Claus, Case worker

Salvation Army Windsor: Sandor Meszaros, Food Services Supervisor

HTAP Waterdone, Ontario: Sister Celeste Reinhart, and her dedicated team members

Sextrade 101, Public Education and Awareness: Natasha Falle, Executive Director

Canada Fights Human Trafficking: Naomi Baker, Founder

Herbert H. Carnegie, Future Aces Foundation: Bernice Carnegie, Executive Director, Brook Chambers, Presenter, Educator 

 

Media

Toronto Sun: Tamara Cherry, reporter, Crime Bureau

Rogers Television Newmarket: Nancy Coldham, Partner

CBC National Television: Mark Kelly, and the production team

Sing Tao Newspapers: Percta Lam, reporter

Rogers Television, Richmond Hill: Brianne Thom, Videographer- First Local

YRMG: Joe Fantauzzi, Reporter

Ric Esther Bienstock: Producer, Director

Marina Jemenez: Globe and Mail foreign respondent

Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall: Freelance Writer, Toronto 

 

Private Groups / Citizens

MP leader Joy Smith: Member of the Parliament, Winnipeg

Joel Oosterman: Chief of Staff, Office of Joy Smith, MP

Bernice Carnegie and Brook Chambers: Herbert H. Carnegie Future Aces Foundation 

 

Each one of these people received the "First Annual Glendene & Jessie Foster Award" for their dedication and hard work combating human trafficking, but to me, it was even more than that. To me it meant that every one of the recipients would be going home and talking about the award and human trafficking, and during those discussions missing  Jessie Foster would be mentioned.

• April 15, 2010 at the "Glendene & Jessie Foster Award Ceremony", I got the honour ofbeing asked by MP Joy Smith, if I would be interested in going to our nation's capital city, Ottawa, Ontario, to testify at the Senate hearing to get her Bill C-268 to be passed into law. Which it was, but without needing the testimony of citizens.

• May 1, 2010 we started to get responses from some of our local schools for myself, Mark Price from the Kamloops & District Crimes Stoppers and Deb Noel from the Catholic Women's League to do our presentation to educate the students about human trafficking.

• June 1, 2010 there was an article in the Flint (Michigan, USA) Journal newspaper about M.A.T.H.: Burton mother, Lisa Brant (*Canadian mother, Glendene Grant*) aims to raise awareness of human trafficking by starting Mothers Against Trafficking Humans (http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2010/06/burton_mother_lis...). 

• June 8 & 10, 2010 we did our presentation for the grade 11 Social Studies classes at Valleyview Secondary School.

• June 17, 2010, MP Joy Smith's Bill C-268 has finally passed the Senate of Canada. What a day for celebration around our country.

• June 22, 2010 we gave the Walk4Justice 2010 a send-off in Kamloops, British Columbia where they started. This year the walk was to Winnipeg, Manitoba. I had contacted MPJoy Smith about the walkers ending in Winnipeg and she organized a BBQ to welcome them and to celebrate the Walk4Justice 2010 achieving its goal. I am so proud to have been part of this. I hosted the walkers at my home on June 21st with tents pitched all over my side yard. We had dinner provided by our local Domino's Pizza. I called them and told them that the walkers were at my home, and since I had won a contest to geta pizza a week for a year, meaning I won 52 pizzas, so I ordered some then (and the rest we used for a Dine 'N Dance fundraiser for Jessie in July). And I am very proud that a young woman who is like a daughter to me (her mom is one of my long-time friends from teen hood), Shona White and her boyfriend Jarrod Nosan, hosted the walkers at their home in Canmore, Alberta. They enjoyed Jarrod's delicious spaghetti dinner.

• June 29, 2010 marked an historical event, with Bill C-268 receiving Royal Assent. This bill is an Act to Amend the Criminal Code (minimum sentence for offences involving trafficking of persons under the age of eighteen years). Bill C-268 was signed by Justice Rothstein and read by the Speaker of the Canadian Senate, giving the Bill Royal Assent by written declaration.

• July 29, 2010, MP Joy Smith hosted the BBQ for the Walk4Justice when they arrived in Winnipeg, Manitoba. It was held at Birds Hill Park from 12:00 P.M. to 10:30 P.M. They had walked (approximately) 2000 kilometers or 1240 miles. The Walk4Justice 2009 was from Vancouver, British Columbia up the Highway of Tears to Prince Rupert, British Columbia. They walked (approximately) 1230 kilometers or 765 miles! And the first ever walk, the Walk4Justice 2008 was from Vancouver, British Columbia to our nation's capital, Ottawa, Ontario. They walked (approximately) 4700 kilometers or 2900 miles!! The plan for the Walk4Justice 2011 is again to walk to Ottawa again.

• August 18, 2010 I was invited by the L.N.I.B. (Lower Nicola Indian Band) to do a presentation on human trafficking prevention for their youth group. Ages 6 to 18 yearsold. Previously I have only done presentations to high school age students, so I had to change it somewhat to be more suitable for younger kids. This was my first time I did my presentation without Mark from Crime Stoppers and I was very proud of myself. I also got a chance to invite Megan Stevenson from the S.H.O.P. (Social & Health Options for Persons in the sex trade) program, which is within the A.S.K. (Aids Society of Kamloops) to go with me and she got the opportunity to do her own presentation to the group. Prior to this, Megan and I had been talking about a new organization that they want to have a chapter open in Kamloops called C.A.S.E.Y. (Communities Against Sexual Exploitation of Youth).

• August 29, 2010 I got an email from a woman with M.L.A.P. (Maple Leaf Alberta Projects) about being a guest at their upcoming book launch for Professor Perrin's book on human trafficking in Edmonton on October 23, 2010. They took care of my flight and hotel costs.

• September 2010, Timea Nagy's book, called "Walk With Me, Memoirs of a Sex Slave Survivor" is being released. Jessie is mentioned in her book.

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• September 7, 2010, Canadian Public Safety Minister Vic Toews was joined by Joy Smith, Member of Parliament for Kildonan – St. Paul, Manitoba, for an announcement launching a national human trafficking awareness campaign. The federal department of Public Safety is partnering with the RCMP and the Canadian Crime Stoppers Association to launch the Crime Stoppers "Blue Blindfold" Campaign. The campaign will educate the public on human trafficking and provide tools for Canadians to join the fight against human trafficking (which is something that I have been doing for months with Mark Price and the Kamloops & District Crime Stoppers. An article (posted later on) actually said the following about our presentation, in his article about this very announcement: "It was the only one of its kind in the country".

• September 9, 2010 there was a very good article on the Kamloops This Week website by Jeremy Deutsch about the 'Blue Blindfold Campaign', including his interview with me. This article was also in the September 10 hard copy issue. 

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• September 10, 2010 I got a call from one of my local Kamloops Members of Parliament, Cathy McLeod's assistant. She told me Mrs. McLeod was hoping I had time to meet with her next week (of course I have time). We are meeting at 10 A.M. onThursday, September 16, 2010.

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• October 5, 2010, Professor Benjamin Perrin's book, called "Invisible Chains: Canada's Underground World of Human Trafficking" will be released. Jessie is mentioned in his book.

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• October 18, 2010 is Professor Benjamin Perrin's book launch in Vancouver, British Columbia. It will be held at U.B.C. (University British Columbia) where he is an assistant law professor.

• October 19, 2010 was my 53rd birthday and my 5th without knowing where my daughter is, or even if she is alive. All I do know is that Jessie was beaten and forced to work for an escort agency and when she tried to leave she disappeared. My daughter is a human trafficking victim and I want, one day, to have a real HAPPY BIRTHDAY – I want to get answers to my haunting question, WHERE IS JESSIE? On May 27, 2011 it will be Jessie's champagne birthday. She will be 27 on the 27th. I hope to get some answers, any answers, by then.

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• October 22, 2010 is Professor Benjamin Perrin's book launch in Calgary, Alberta.(Calgary is where Jessie was born, and though my children and I moved to Kamloops, British Columbia when she was just 3 years old, Jessie did move back to Calgary when she was 16 years old and in grade 11. Jessie graduated from high school in Calgary in 2002. It was in Calgary that Jessie met the person who took her to the USA, which was the beginning of the end of life as the Grant/Foster/Hoflin families had known it, and the beginning of the nightmare of our lives.)

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• October 23, 2010 is Professor Benjamin Perrin's book launch in Edmonton, Alberta, the one to which I am invited to be the guest of M.L.A.P. (Maple Leaf Alberta Projects).

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CONTINUED IN PART 3 . . . 

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