Roberts Investigative Services
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Human Trafficking Investigations

Board-certified human trafficking investigations across Florida. Trauma-informed work for families, advocates, counsel and employers.

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A trafficking victim holding a handwritten sign reading "I'm not for sale." Text overlay: Uncover truth and ensure justice.

Human Trafficking Investigations

Board Certified, Trauma-Informed, Realistic About What We Can Do

Trafficking cases are not ordinary investigative work and should not be sold as though they are. They involve people who are frightened, accounts that shift under pressure, and evidence that degrades quickly. They also attract a great deal of confident marketing from firms with no specific training in the subject.

Danielle Roberts is board certified in Human Trafficking Investigations and as a forensic interviewer, and has worked criminal defence through Florida's Nineteenth Judicial Circuit. That combination — the certification and the courtroom experience — is what this page is actually offering.

If someone is in immediate danger, call 911. The National Human Trafficking Hotline — 1-888-373-7888 — is free, confidential and staffed 24 hours a day. If you are not sure whether what you are seeing is trafficking, call them first. That is the right first step, ahead of hiring anyone.

Please Note: Initial Retainer

This $500 fee serves as an initial retainer to begin the preliminary Case Review, Analysis, and Strategy Development.

Due to the sensitive and unpredictable nature of this work, cases with significant complexity may require additional funding. All services and fees beyond this initial retainer will be discussed with you and require your authorization before proceeding.

What We Do

  • Locating and skip tracing — finding a person who has been moved, has stopped making contact, or is being kept from their family. This is often the whole of what a family actually needs, and it is work we do routinely through our missing persons practice.
  • Covert surveillance and intelligence — lawful documentation of activity, movement and association, planned around the safety of everyone involved including the suspected victim.
  • Trauma-informed interviewing — forensic interviews of victims and witnesses, conducted so that the account survives scrutiny rather than collapsing under it.
  • Criminal defence investigation — independent examination of the state's case where someone stands accused. Trafficking allegations are serious and they are not always correct, and defence investigation is a legitimate part of how that gets tested.
  • Consultation and training — for businesses, sports organisations and non-profits wanting their staff to recognise the indicators rather than to have a policy document nobody reads.
  • Internal and corporate review — where a concern has surfaced inside an organisation, examined through our corporate investigations practice.

What We Do Not Do

Being explicit about this is more useful to you than another paragraph of reassurance.

We do not conduct raids or rescues. We do not infiltrate criminal organisations. We have no arrest powers and no authority to compel anyone to do anything. Where a matter belongs with law enforcement or the hotline, we will tell you so — including when that means we are not the right people to hire.

Every case is worked inside Chapter 493 and Florida Statute 934.03, and trafficking offences themselves sit under Florida Statute 787.06. No wiretapping, no trespass, no pretexting into accounts. In this case type more than any other, evidence gathered carelessly does not merely fail — it can put a person in danger.

Who Instructs Us

Families trying to find someone. Attorneys on both sides of a prosecution. Advocacy organisations that need a fact established rather than assumed. Employers who have found something in their own operation and need to know what it is. The instruction differs; the standard of evidence does not.

Your Questions Answered

What are the three elements of human trafficking?
Federal law breaks it into act, means and purpose. The act is recruiting, harbouring, transporting, providing or obtaining a person. The means is force, fraud or coercion. The purpose is a commercial sex act or involuntary labour. All three are normally required — with one critical exception: where a minor is involved in a commercial sex act, the means element is not required at all. A child cannot consent, and no proof of force or coercion is needed to establish the offence.
What is an investigator's role in a trafficking case?
It depends entirely on who is instructing us. For a family, it is usually locating someone and documenting the circumstances they are in. For defence counsel, it is independent verification of the state's account. For an employer or non-profit, it is examining whether something inside the organisation is what it appears to be. In every version the work is the same discipline: lawful evidence, carefully documented, that holds up when someone else examines it.
What should I do if I suspect trafficking right now?
If someone is in immediate danger, call 911. For anything else, the National Human Trafficking Hotline is 1-888-373-7888, staffed around the clock, free and confidential — that is the right first call, ahead of us. An investigator is useful once there is something to document or someone to find. Do not attempt to intervene, confront a suspected trafficker, or conduct your own surveillance; it is dangerous for you and it can destroy the evidentiary value of what is already there.
Do you work with law enforcement or independently?
Both, depending on the instruction, and we are clear about the boundary. We are a licensed private agency, not a law enforcement body. We have no arrest powers, no subpoena powers and no authority to compel anyone to speak to us. Where a case belongs with law enforcement we say so and support the referral rather than competing with it. Where a private investigation is the right instrument — a civil matter, a defence case, an internal review — that is our work.
Will you interview a victim?
Only where it is appropriate, and only using trauma-informed methods. Danielle is board certified as a forensic interviewer as well as in human trafficking investigations, which matters here more than in almost any other case type: a badly conducted interview retraumatises the person and contaminates their account for everyone who comes after. Sometimes the correct professional answer is that we should not be the ones conducting it, and we will tell you that.

Start With a Conversation

Tell us what you are seeing. We will tell you honestly whether an investigation is the right instrument, whether this should go to the hotline or to law enforcement first, and what our involvement would actually cost.

The information provided on this website is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Please consult with an attorney for advice regarding your specific situation.

Where We Work

We handle these matters statewide — St. Lucie County, agricultural Okeechobee County, Palm Beach County and cases that cross county lines.

Further Reading

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Every case is handled with discretion and a commitment to court-ready results. Reach out for a free, confidential consultation.

Request a Consultation Call (888) 772-7894