Every year, Mardi Gras brings hundreds of thousands of visitors to New Orleans, filling the city with parades, music, and celebration. Large in-market events like this, often raise questions about whether human trafficking increases as well.
The reality is more complex.
Human trafficking does not occur only during major events. It happens in communities year-round. However, large gatherings can create conditions that allow exploiters to make commercial sexual exploitation more visible or more profitable.
I have spent my career working in federal law enforcement, including nearly 25 years as a Special Agent with Homeland Security Investigations. During my career, I conducted, managed and led task forces focused on countering threats posed by human trafficking and child exploitation networks.
Law enforcement and survivor care organizations face serious challenges when attempting to conduct effective large-scale human trafficking intervention operations at major events like Mardi Gras. Investigating and stopping human trafficking presents unique challenges that go far beyond typical criminal investigations. These cases involve vulnerable individuals, organized criminal networks, limited resources, and legal and technological obstacles that can make identifying and prosecuting traffickers extremely difficult.
These challenges are further exacerbated during notable events. Throngs of large crowds, enhanced security efforts, and limited physical access make it even more difficult for multi-disciplinary teams to effectively counter human trafficking threats.
This year, as Senior Vice President for Law Enforcement Operations and Enterprise at Our Rescue, I was invited to observe an active anti-human trafficking operation conducted at the beginning of Mardi Gras festivities. The operation was led by the Louisiana State Police – an organization establishing its own human trafficking unit– and its partners. With human trafficking data from Marinus Analytics as a backdrop, the goal of the operation was to identify potential victims of human trafficking and arrest traffickers. I witnessed first-hand the hurdles evident during mass gatherings that were ever-present during the Mardi Gras operation, highlighting once again how challenging the scourge of human trafficking has become. And that’s what we aim to help here at Our Rescue.
What the Data Shows
Researchers at Marinus Analytics analyzed patterns in online advertisements posted on adult service websites in the weeks leading up to Mardi Gras. They focused on signals researchers commonly track when studying the commercial sex market.
One signal researchers examined was the number of ads labeled “new to town.” Providers typically use these advertisements to indicate that they recently traveled into a city after posting ads elsewhere.
According to Benedikt Boecking, Head of Machine Learning at Marinus Analytics:
“Using our dataset of adult service website advertisements, we conducted a real-time analysis of activity surrounding Mardi Gras in New Orleans. We observed a significant and time-bound spike in ‘new to town’ ads—ads posted by providers who had recently traveled into the city after being active elsewhere. The increase began gradually in early February and rose to a significant spike around the time of the holiday.”
Researchers compared this activity with patterns in other cities across the region to determine whether Mardi Gras influenced the increase. Those cities did not show the same spike in activity. This comparison suggests that the surge likely relates to the influx of visitors during Mardi Gras rather than a broader regional trend.
Why Movement Matters
Experts widely recognize movement as a potential red flag associated with human trafficking.
Traffickers often move individuals they target between cities to reach new buyers, increase profits, or isolate individuals from support networks that might help them leave an exploitative situation.
At the same time, movement alone does not equate to human trafficking. Some individuals in the commercial sex market travel voluntarily, so researchers must interpret these signals carefully and consider them alongside other information.
To strengthen their analysis, Marinus Analytics used advanced clustering algorithms to group related ads by shared identifiers such as phone numbers and online accounts. These tools allow researchers to track movement patterns across locations.
Even after accounting for repeated postings, researchers still observed a pronounced spike around Mardi Gras. The data showed that a large number of new providers entered the city rather than a small group posting ads more frequently.
Understanding the Bigger Picture
Events like Mardi Gras do not create human trafficking. However, exploiters may attempt to take advantage of increased crowds and potential buyers during large gatherings.
While data helps identify patterns, each signal ultimately represents a person whose safety and autonomy may be at risk. Data-driven insights ultimately help organizations, service providers, and law enforcement anticipate potential risks, allocate resources, and strengthen prevention efforts during major events. When patterns like this emerge, they help communities prepare more informed responses that prioritize both enforcement and survivor support.
As Benedikt Boecking explains:
“Through our partnership, our data-driven insights help stakeholders better understand risk dynamics around events and support targeted prevention, resource allocation, and response strategies.”
During the enforcement operations around Mardi Gras, law enforcement worked diligently to identify survivors and place them on the path to empowerment. The reality is, the challenges that complicate these operations persist. Louisiana State Police and its partners are not unlike other law enforcement agencies in the process of creating human trafficking units; training, technical equipment, cohesive partnerships with survivor care organizations, and community outreach are key to building successful multi-disciplinary teams.
Our Rescue is actively engaging with Louisiana State Police, for example, to make sure future operations — including those tied to large events — are conducted as comprehensively as possible. One way Our Rescue is supporting them already with grants for technical equipment to enable even more successful human trafficking operations. The bottom line goal of Our Rescue is to meet law enforcement agencies, survivor care organizations, and communities where they are in the development of anti-trafficking systems and actors, assess short- and long-term needs, empower their development, and work toward sustainable models that make our communities safer.
Celebrations like Mardi Gras bring culture, tradition, and community together. At Our Rescue, it’s a priority for us to help communities understand how exploitation can intersect with large gatherings while empowering law enforcement, survivor care agencies, and community-based organizations who work so hard to stop it. Together, we can protect those at the most risk.
