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Ashley’s Story

My sister Ashley was 29 when she died.  She left behind two children, my niece and nephew, and took with her another, as she was pregnant when she passed on. Ashley did not have the best life.  Technically she was my half-sister, we had the same dad but different moms. Little did I know that our mothers would be the defining factor between her lifestyle and mine.  Ashley’s mother battled with addiction and mental health issues her whole life.  She never got the help she needed, and when she had Ashley her problems intensified.  My family tried to get Ashley who was then just a little girl to come live with us.  My aunt, my mother, and my father all tried to get full custody of this little girl but their efforts were to no avail.

            As I said, Ashley’s mom was an addict.  She was in trouble with the police but she still needed that “fix” so she began to send Ashley onto the streets for her.  At that point, Ashley didn’t have a record, so her consequences if caught would be a lot less than those of her mothers.  Ashley was her drug runner.  She had her shoplifting shampoo in CVS because all of the money went to drugs.  At the age of 12, Ashley was sent into the world of sex trafficking and prostitution.  Her mother became her “pimp” and would send Ashley to a local motel in Marietta to have sex with grown men for money that went to her mother’s drug habit.  Now remember this was her only daughter. 

            Ashley's life then spiraled.  She was in and out of jail, still having sex with men for money for her mom, and she herself became an addict.  However, deep within Ashley was always a want to get better.  She started to straighten out when she met a man and became pregnant with her first child.  Ashley cleaned herself up, much to her mother’s disgust, and moved out with the father of her child.  She got a job and started to raise the child in a stable home.  This went on for a few years and during that time she had another child. However, things took a turn for the worse when she was in a car accident and needed prescription painkillers.  Due to her addictive past, she again became addicted. She got fired from her job, she was losing the apartment, and eventually her boyfriend left pushing her right back into the arms of her mother.  Their lifestyle quickly resumed and Ashley was again being trafficked and prostituted by her mom.  If she said no or resisted her mother would beat her until she would agree.

            The last time I saw Ashley was the summer before she died.  My father took Ashley, her two children, and me to Hershey Park knowing that the kids were never there before.  I remember pulling up in front of Ashley’s mothers house and the two kids coming out but not Ashley.  That’s when her little boy who was about five at the time got into the car.  He told us “mommy will be out in a minute, she's trying to cover up what grandma did last night”.  Ashley soon came out with cuts and bruises all over her face with makeup caked on to try to hide the marks.  So that was what grandma did?

            We got the call December of that year that Ashley was found dead in her mother’s home.  She had missed her probation meeting after getting out of rehab a week earlier.  When the officer went to the home her mother tried to tell them she was still sleeping, but when they pushed past her Ashley was dead in her room.  Her last words ever spoken to me were “keep going to school, don’t ever let yourself get into the situation I am.  It’s too late for me to change, so all I want is to see you go on and have a great life.  You never got into this lifestyle, you always kept your head on straight, you're so smart, and I'm so proud of you.”

            When we went to the funeral home to see Ashley before her mother had her cremated, the bruises on her face were obvious.  She was beaten before she died.  Ashley died of a drug overdose.  The nature of that overdose, whether intentional or not, and who was responsible we will never know. 

Trafficking is closer to home than you think.  Take it from me; it is very hard to get someone out of that lifestyle.  It is a lifetime battle, it isn't something that you help someone out of and just brush your hands of it.  Anything can cause them to slip back into that world.  For us, it was even harder to help Ashley because that was her mother.  All that a little girl ever wants is her mother’s approval.  It was not some random scary man on the corner that pushed her into that life; it was her own flesh and blood.  If you know someone that is in this situation please get him or her help.  We tried to get Ashley help her whole life but we couldn’t break the bond between a mother and her daughter.  I am telling her story to raise awareness.  It is still very hard to talk about the situation, but it’s even harder to get that phone call that someone has passed on from this lifestyle.

Get help and be aware.

In loving memory.

Jordan Hall