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With an emphasis on investigating and prosecuting human trafficking cases and bringing justice to victims.
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It's a reflection Bonta says of the new realities his office is confronting. - Right now the illicit marketplace is bigger than the regulated marketplace.
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We are hearing from our local law enforcement partners, and our own intelligence tells us that human trafficking is a significant part of the illicit marketplace for cannabis in California.
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Sheriff's Department search warrant! - And that's exactly what we've seen firsthand. NBC News met nine Chinese workers during a raid of an illegal cannabis farm in San Bernardino California who by all indications were trafficking victims.
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Despite they say being promised a lucrative opportunity, they told us they'd not been paid, and were living in squalor.
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The person or people who brought you here, did they tell you the truth about what you were coming to do? - No, they didn't tell me that.
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If they told her it would be like this she wouldn't have come? - As you know it's extraordinarily difficult to get victims of human trafficking to come forward.
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Is this policy change going to help victims of human trafficking who are exploited at marijuana grows to come forward?
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Absolutely, it's a focal point of our new initiative, we know how to support victims, how to liberate them from their abusers, how to provide them with justice.
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This more sophisticated approach which will also target environmental crime at grow sites, aims to open investigations to take down the international crim middle organizations responsible.
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These illicit cannabis grows often do have a transnational component, whether it be of Chinese influence or other countries.
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But the challenge of getting victims to cooperate remains. - I wonder if you have a message to the victims of human trafficking who we met in San Bernardino who were afraid to come forward.
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That's simple, we care about you, we support you, the human traffickers who violated the law, and committed crimes, and abused you, and turned you into victims that they're how to held accountable and brought to justice under the full extent of the law and the full authority of my office.
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An acknowledgment by California's top cop of an evolving illicit marketplace with workers toiling in the shadows, and now a new push for justice. Jacob Soboroff, NBC News.