Honduras Grabs Chief of Sex Trafficking Operation which Reached into Belize

Denia Syuapa Ochoa

A major arrest is being reported in Honduras on an issuing plaguing Belize and neighboring countries.  No less than an employee in the Ministry of Health in Honduras was arrested for trafficking in persons in the forms of forced labour and commercial sexual exploitation. Honduran authorities picked up Denia Syuapa Ochoa in San Pedro Sula for trafficking young women. Honduras media reports that Ochoa was bringing some seventy young women to work in bars in Belize. According to one media report, the country’s ombudsman office stated that Ochoa was dedicated to “capturing the victims so they could work in bars located in San Pedro, Ambergris Caye [Belize] where they were sexually exploited and required to perform forced labor.” Ochoa was also transporting victims to San Pedro Sula from where they were traveling to Guatemala and then to Belize. Ochoa was busted by a Honduran operation called “Firestorm” which dismantles networks of assailants and organized crime networks.