Crimes & offenses, provides that advertising access to sexual or labor servitude is a Class B felony
Summary
HB94 amends Alabama’s human trafficking statute for second-degree human trafficking. The bill expands and clarifies prohibited conduct to include knowingly advertising, either online or in print, access to another person’s sexual servitude or labor servitude. It also restates existing trafficking conduct such as recruiting, harboring, transporting, restraining, or otherwise obtaining a person for labor or sexual servitude, and benefiting financially from participation in such a venture.
The bill makes technical, nonsubstantive updates to the statutory language to modernize style and clarify wording, while preserving the offense classification as a Class B felony. It also adds language addressing corporate or other entity liability when an agent acts within the scope of employment on behalf of the entity, and it provides that obstructing or interfering with enforcement of the section is itself a Class B felony. The act takes effect October 1, 2025.
Impact
HB94 amends Section 13A-6-153 of the Code of Alabama 1975, broadening the reach of the second-degree human trafficking law to expressly cover advertising of sexual or labor servitude and clarifying how corporations and other legal entities may be prosecuted. It also reinforces enforcement by criminalizing obstruction or interference with enforcement efforts. The bill affects individuals, businesses, online advertisers, and entities whose agents engage in trafficking-related conduct, while leaving the felony classification unchanged at Class B.
Sentiment
The bill appears to have received overwhelmingly positive and noncontroversial support. Voting history shows unanimous or near-unanimous passage in both chambers, with no recorded dissenting votes. The absence of committee transcript discussion suggests the measure was treated as a straightforward anti-trafficking update rather than a contested policy change.
Contention
No notable contention is reflected in the available record. The main policy change is the explicit inclusion of advertising access to sexual or labor servitude, which could raise enforcement or free-speech questions in other contexts, but no such objections appear in the votes or committee materials provided. The corporate-liability language and the obstruction provision are the only provisions that might draw interpretive scrutiny, though the bill passed without opposition.