Expands criminal and civil penalties for human trafficking, and expands human trafficking training requirements for law enforcement. *

The provision eliminating the statute of limitations for human trafficking offenses was struck entirely.

The civil action provision (C.2C:13-8.1) that allowed victims of human trafficking to sue perpetrators and those who knowingly benefited from the crime was struck.

The provision making attempts and conspiracies to commit human trafficking first-degree crimes (matching the penalty for the completed offense) was removed.

Wiretapping authority was narrowed by removing stalking (C.2C:12-10) and third/fourth degree cyber-harassment (C.2C:33-4.1) from the list of offenses for which interception is authorized, and by limiting the impersonation/identity theft provision to paragraph (3) of subsection c. of C.2C:21-17 only.

The Division of Violence Intervention and Victim Assistance (established by P.L.2023, c.167) was added as a required consulting partner for developing and approving human trafficking training courses for police, hotel/motel staff, and health care facility employees.

The witness protection provision (C.2A:84A-32.4) that allowed victims or witnesses in human trafficking cases to be prevented from directly hearing or viewing the defendant during proceedings was struck.

The requirement for each county prosecutor to establish a Human Trafficking Response Team, along with the $750,000 appropriation to fund them, was removed.

The mandatory training program for judges, prosecutors, public defenders, and other legal personnel, along with the $250,000 appropriation to fund it, was struck.

The forfeiture provision (C.2C:64-3) was modified so that property seized in connection with a human trafficking offense may be used by a prosecuting agency as authorized, and any remaining property is distributed 'to a prosecuting agency or other entity' before being applied to restitution.

The section requiring employment and dating advertisements to include educational messages about human trafficking, with third-degree criminal penalties and $250,000 civil penalties for non-compliance, was removed.

A knowledge requirement was added to the financial benefit provision: a person must 'knowingly' receive anything of value and must know or should have known that the scheme violates the trafficking statute, rather than simply benefiting from participation in a violating scheme.

A new paragraph (4) was added to the human trafficking crime (C.2C:13-8) that specifically criminalizes holding, recruiting, luring, enticing, harboring, transporting, providing, or obtaining a child under 18 to provide labor or services, separating child labor trafficking from child sexual exploitation which remains in paragraph (3).

The adult human trafficking provision (paragraph 1) now explicitly requires the victim to be 'at least 18 years of age,' and the child sexual exploitation provision (paragraph 3) no longer includes 'or to provide labor or services' since that was moved to the new paragraph (4).

Language was added to both the human trafficking and facilitation sections stating that nothing in the plea agreement provisions shall be construed to alter or limit a prosecutor's authority or discretion to enter any plea agreement the prosecutor deems appropriate, unless otherwise provided in Attorney General guidelines.