“I remember the last time that I was sold.”
These were the opening words of Jenna McKaye, starkly spoken and immediately ensnaring the attention of the entire crowd gathered for this year’s Human Trafficking Awareness event.
An author, advocate and survivor of human trafficking, McKaye was the keynote speaker at the Soroptimist International Pahrump Valley’s 2025 Voices of Change – Stop Human Trafficking community forum and her story was one both devastating and inspiring.
While still a teenager in high school, McKaye was groomed by the man who would eventually become her husband as well as her trafficker, a situation McKaye said she hadn’t even realized was possible.
“He married me within a short amount of time and then, there was a trip to Las Vegas,” McKaye recalled. “I remember standing on Fremont Street and I was in a souvenir shop. I was looking out the window and he was talking to a man who looked like he might be involved in some kind of criminal activity. I don’t know what happened during that conversation. I just know that night, the abuse I was already experiencing escalated.”
McKaye was then taken to Tijuana, Mexico where she was tattooed with a branding. Still unaware of what her husband had planned, she returned to the apartment they shared, where she was sold for the first time.
“Now I knew I was a victim of rape, but I didn’t understand what the money meant,” McKaye explained. “Prostitution is the movie ‘Pretty Woman’ and that’s what that looked like. Trafficking is that word we never really hear of or it’s just a documentary I saw of a kid in another country, chained to a radiator. Neither were what my situation looked like, so what was happening to me?”
It took many years for McKaye to finally realize that she was a victim of human trafficking and even longer to confront the repercussions to her life, body and mental health. But her journey is one she now works to share, penning her memoir titled “Grit and Grace,” speaking at community events around the country and educating first responders.
“Jenna continues to train hospital staff, law enforcement and other first responders on how to identify victims of sex trafficking and labor trafficking and respond with trauma-informed care,” the event program detailed. “Her personal keynote speaking engagements leave a notable impression among a variety of audiences, including the United Nations.”
The Soroptimist event also included remarks from Jenny Fay, a representative of Olive Crest, who has personal experience in working with sex trafficking survivors. As the Community Engagement and Development Director for Olive Crest, Fay’s primary focus is on strengthening families and communities. By doing so, it reduces the risk of children and young adults of becoming a victim through the process of grooming.
“Because what a trafficker doesn’t want is their potential victim connected with healthy people who are close enough to spot things in their life to say, that doesn’t sound healthy, that’s not normal in a relationship,” Fay stated. “If we can strengthen families, that’s going to make a huge difference for children who are vulnerable to being trafficked.”
Grooming, Fay explained, involves several steps that lead a person toward becoming a victim. The first is befriending, after which comes intoxication. She stressed that this does not necessarily mean intoxication through the use of drugs or alcohol but can include emotional intoxication as well. Alienation and isolation follow, severing the ties that the would-be victim has to those in their lives. Desensitization is that last step before the trafficker capitalizes.
If the process of grooming can be identified early on, it can be disrupted, which Fay emphasized is why it is key to lean into the awkward conversations that could reveal a looming threat.
Several Soroptimist members spoke too, as did a representative of Bikers Against Bullying, which partnered with the Soroptimist club on this year’s event. Members of Bikers Against Bullying also lent a hand by handing out the brown box lunches provided by Ernie Rangel and the event was capped off with a round of raffles for autographed copies of McKaye’s book.
For more information on the work Soroptimist does in the local community visit SoroptimistPV.com
Contact reporter Robin Hebrock at rhebrock@pvtimes.com