On Wednesday, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed anti-human trafficking legislation into law, including SB 370 – the ninth piece of legislation brought forward and passed by First Lady Marty Kemp and the Georgians for Refuge, Action, Compassion, and Education Commission (GRACE) Commission.
According to a press release from Kemp’s office, “SB 370 includes convenience stores, body art studios, businesses that employ licensed massage therapists, manufacturing facilities, and medical offices in the list of businesses that must post the human trafficking notice; allows the Georgia Board of Massage Therapy to initiate inspections of massage therapy businesses and board recognized massage therapy educational programs without notice; requires massage therapists affix a passport sized photo with their license certificate that is displayed at their place of work; and requires massage therapy board members to annually complete human trafficking awareness training.”
“For years Georgia was considered a hot spot for human trafficking, but thanks to the GRACE Commission, under the leadership of First Lady Marty Kemp, we have established Georgia as a national leader in this fight by passing legislation that cracks down on both traffickers and buyers while also, and even more importantly, empowering survivors,” said Kemp. “I could not be more proud to sign the ninth piece of legislation brought forward by the GRACE Commission since its formation only 5 years ago, continue to go after human traffickers and make sure that those caught in trafficking situations know in Georgia, there is always help for them, both in getting to safety and in moving on to a better life.”
In addition to SB 370, Kemp signed into law two other pieces of legislation:
- HB 993, which “creates the felony offense of grooming of a minor and prohibits the defense from prosecution for offenses relating to visual mediums depicting minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct on the basis that the visual medium was created, adapted, or modified to show an identifiable minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct.”
- HB 1201 which “allows human trafficking survivors that received first offender or conditional discharge status the ability to vacate such status for certain crimes, so long as the crime was a direct result of being a victim of human trafficking, and defines the term ‘commercial sexual exploitation recovery center.’
