An Army hero has bravely shared her incredible story of survival after being sex-trafficked as a teen. Amber Causey was just 16 when she was taken in by a manipulative pimp who forced her to sell sex. She was raped hundreds of times and spent a miserable existence sleeping between crack houses and buses just to say warm.
Now aged 29, Amber is a celebrated US Army veteran and has completely transformed her life.
A mum-of-two with two master’s degrees, she has devoted her life to ending the child trafficking trade.
Amber told how her ordeal began one day when her pimp flirtatiously dropped a note with his number at her feet. The man, whom she believed was her boyfriend, lavished her with food, new clothes and a phone.
But after a few weeks, he took her to his apartment and ordered her to walk the streets selling sex and threatened to beat her if she rebelled.
Amber, who had already experienced abuse as a child, was forced to sleep with up to ten men-a-day and claims she was “severely beaten” if she made less than $500.
For nine months in 2006 and 2007, Amber survived on a daily allowance of $20 for food and condoms.
The former staff sergeant owes her life to a recruiter who came looking for her two years after she registered her interest at a school careers fair
Amber said: “The pimp told me that he could make my dreams come true and he told me he loved me. “I loved him and I believed him. I felt worthy when I was with him. “He was courting me, but then one day he took me to his apartment and there were two other girls there and I wasn’t allowed to leave.”
“I could either get beat or get raped or fall in line.”I turned into a teen prostitute and by the time I turned 17 I had had hundreds of sex partners. “One time a guy held a knife to me and left me naked next to a factory. I just fell completely down into the ground.
“I got to the point where I would rather be beaten and starved than put myself at the mercy of another man. “I couldn’t mentally keep myself together any more so the pimp packed my stuff up in a bag and dumped me at the side of the road.”
Amber was back on the streets, but she occasionally checked in with her sister.
Amber, from Chicago, went on to join the Army in 2007 and had a glittering seven-and-a-half year military career, with the 2nd Battalion of the 44th Air Defense Artillery Regiment in Iraq.
The man who trafficked Amber, who she does not wish to name for safety reasons, was not convicted in her case but has served time for battery and drug offences.
Meanwhile Amber, who has a criminal record after being convicted of prostitution in 2006 despite being just 16 at the time, has devoted her life to helping end human trafficking.
She tours high schools educating young people on the topic and hopes to influence policy. Her aim is to create a world free of sexual exploitation for her daughter Aaliyah, eight, and son Armoni, two.
