14 Nov 2026, 11:20 AM

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In 2016, Mariah Rief, then 19, thought she was going to a modelling job at a hotel. Once there, she was sex trafficked. She knows of 15 fellow victims who have since died by suicide or drug overdose – and is determined to stop it ever happening againWhen people ask Mariah Rief about her experience as a survivor of sex trafficking, they tend to start with the Craigslist ad which led the then 19-year-old to a “modelling shoot” at the Hilton hotel in San Diego. For others, the story starts when Rief enters the lobby and meets Theodore Gyi, the “photographer”. Or after they’ve taken the elevator up to a room, Rief standing at the threshold, Gyi behind her blocking her exit – and just inside the door, the silhouette of a second man waiting.Whenever she talks about it, and whatever the questions, Rief always braces herself for blame, because, to some, it makes no sense. “You get, ‘But why did she answer that ad?’ ‘Why did she walk inside?’ and, my favourite, ‘Where were her parents?’” says Rief. “If you live in an idyllic world, it’s hard to imagine how this could happen.” The true starting point is years earlier. Rief’s beginnings, her childhood, layers of trauma and chaos, fast-tracked her to that hotel room in November 2016, believing that finally, life might be giving her a break. “It’s painful to say it but I was truly the perfect victim,” she says. “I saw that job as an opportunity. When I arrived at that hotel, I thought I was so lucky.” Continue reading...

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