The fastest-growing group of human trafficking victims in Orange County is children.

A report scheduled to be released today from the Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force suggests that the average age of people coerced into sex work or other types of forced labor over the past three years has fallen, and that half of all trafficking victims locally now are younger than 18.

The Task Force’s eighth report on local human trafficking, based on data collected in 2023 and ’24, found that the youngest victim was 6 and that the average age of victimized minors was 14, meaning a significant segment of that group was age 13 or younger.

A similar study issued two years ago, based on data collected in 2021 and ’22, found that about a third (36%) of all local trafficking victims were child

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