Held by ECPAT-USA, the Freedom Awards bring together a highly selective group of 200 luminaries in the corporate, philanthropic, government, and media communities in support of ECPAT-USA’s vital work to ensure no child is bought or sold. The highlight of the evening is the recognition of the world’s most remarkable individuals for their contributions in ending child trafficking.

Jett Jeffery and Glenn Logan

Delta Flight Products

Rescue Award

Delta employees Jett Jeffery and Glen Logan were sitting in an Orlando-area McDonald’s on a Saturday afternoon in August enjoying their lunch when two girls walked in the restaurant who looked completely out of place.

Around 15 or 16 years old, the girls were dressed inappropriately for the area. The man with them looked much older, and the girls were timid around him. When he finished eating his lunch, he stepped outside, and the girls started chatting with each other. When he returned, they stopped talking immediately.

“It just didn’t fit,” Logan says of the experience in a Delta awareness campaign video.

When the man started snapping his fingers at the girls and urging them to get ready to go quickly, Jeffery and Logan looked at each other and Logan remembers them asking each other at the same time, “Are we seeing what we’re seeing?”

The two decided they couldn’t just walk away from what they had just seen. Jeffery went outside to get the plates, make, and model of the car, and reported the incident to local law enforcement. Later that day, they received a call back from the sheriff's department that the vehicle had come back as stolen.

The two credit the anti-trafficking training they received from Delta as the reason either of them had noticed anything unusual about the situation at all. Jeffery said, to him, what he was seeing at that McDonald’s lined up almost exactly with the indicators of potential instances of trafficking that he had been taught to look for training.

“It is vital for Delta to take a leadership role in combating human trafficking,” Jeffery said. “By working together and educating employees and customers, we can shed light on the epidemic. Every company can make a statement to traffickers that their actions will not be tolerated.

Both Jeffery and Logan hope that their experience is one that causes those who hear it to think about their role in ending trafficking and take that extra minute to be aware of their surroundings.

“Trafficking can take place anywhere, at any time,” Jeffery said. “If you think you are witnessing human trafficking, please report it! It is better to report the incident than let it go and know you could have saved someone’s life.”