MORE than 40 alleged victims of human trafficking, including families with children, have been rescued in Bradford.

Police are now investigating claims that they were brought to the district for exploitation.

The victims are thought to be from Eastern Europe.

Three men, aged 43, 33 and 28, and a woman, aged 51, were arrested on suspicion of fraud and human trafficking.

Police, working with a number of other agencies, including the Department for Work and Pensions, the Hope For Justice charity and Bradford Council, began a two-day operation on Wednesday across the Bradford district.

Warrants were executed at six addresses and almost 40 other addresses were visited, where vulnerable victims were rescued.

They are now undergoing physical and emotional assessments.

Superintendent Vince Firth, of Bradford District Police, said a number of people had been taken to witness referral centres where they were being seen by doctors, social workers and specially-trained police officers.

Supt Firth said 41 vulnerable people had been found at the addresses, which were right across the Bradford district.

He said they were a mixture of men, women and children, and some were families of Eastern European origin.

Supt Firth said: "I cannot say anything about their physical and mental condition. Health professionals are making assessments."

He added: "It is a very complex investigation. We have a large number of detectives working on this, interviewing potential witnesses and victims. It's a very big operation."

The operation took place only days after information was received about human trafficking and fraud allegations.

Contingency plans were put in place, involving Protective Services Crime division and local police, the DWP, the National Crime Agency, Hope For Justice, health and social care professionals and Bradford Council's emergency planning officer.

Supt Firth said: "We visited 38 addresses, across the Bradford district, to make sure that people there were safe.

"We had information that there were potentially vulnerable people at those addresses who were being trafficked by a group of people. As soon as the agencies got that information we felt it was important to act as quickly as possible. The partnership response in Bradford in these situations is second to none."

Supt Firth said four people, who allegedly had links to all the addresses, had been arrested and questioned.

The three men were last night released on bail pending further inquiries. The woman was earlier released on bail.

The superintendent added: "We are working very closely with the Hope For Justice charity. We are all committed, as a partnership, when we get information about people being exploited in the Bradford district, to mobilise immediately and pull together to safeguard those people and get them out of the situations they are in.

"We are doing everything in our power to bring to justice those who are exploiting vulnerable people."

Supt Firth said he could not give details of the alleged exploitation in this case.

But often people who are trafficked are subjected to sexual exploitation, slavery, forced labour and fraud.

Supt Firth said it was the biggest operation of its type there had been in the Bradford district.

He went on: "Hopefully, people will take a message from this, that if they know of anybody being exploited, if they ring the police or other agencies, we will deal with it."

West Yorkshire Police and Crime Commissioner, Mark Burns-Williamson, who has set aside £1 million to tackle trafficking gangs, said: "We have been dealing with a major event and it has been challenging. But it has demonstrated that we are able to act quickly when information is received.

"We are making sure we are supporting the victims as best we can, in already difficult circumstances, for them to understand they have been trafficked and exploited in quite a ruthless way.

"Once they have been brought into that cycle of treatment, in effectively an organised criminal activity, it's difficult for them to cope without this type of intervention.

"It's essential that agencies learn whatever lessons they can from the information gathered from this type of operation."

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