victims

The Epstein Files Transparency Act (2025) allows withholding or redaction of files that contain victims' names, child sexual abuse material, classified content, or information that could affect active investigations.

Legislation can include provisions to protect the identities of victims and whistleblowers by redacting names from released criminal or investigative files.

Sex traffickers may coerce victims through threats of violence, including threats to kill, and by restricting victims' movement and ability to communicate with others.

Victims of sex trafficking are sometimes recruited through financial vulnerability and promised payment for sexual services but receive little or no pay, while traffickers retain the majority of client payments.

Sex traffickers may transport victims between locations, including to and from airports, as part of facilitating commercial sexual exploitation.

Plea agreements commonly specify recommended sentence ranges that are negotiated between prosecutors and defendants but can be contested by victims or family members and are subject to a judge's review.

Prosecutors are often reluctant to pursue campus sexual assault cases, and that reluctance can lead to significant delays or years before charges are filed.

Common coercive tactics used by traffickers include withholding victims' passports, threatening victims' families, using threats or force, and inducing dependency through drugs.

A district attorney's office can withdraw criminal charges if key victims or witnesses fail to appear in court.

Idaho law provides that profits a criminal would receive from telling or commercializing their crime (for example, through a movie, book, or magazine article) are first directed to the state treasurer and placed into an escrow account to be made available for victims or their families.

Disclosure laws can authorize withholding of victims' personally identifiable information and child sexual abuse material from public release.