Somaly Mam set up the Somaly Mam Foundation, raised money, appeared on major television programs, and spoke at many international events.
15 Facts About Somaly Mam
2.
Somaly Mam moved back to live in Cambodia before returning to the US later that year to begin new fundraising activities.
3.
Somaly Mam was born to a tribal minority family in Mondulkiri Province, Cambodia.
4.
Somaly Mam was investigated by a journalist working in Cambodia, and his allegations that key parts of her early life were false was carried by Newsweek in May 2014.
5.
Somaly Mam said that she was abused by her "grandfather" until she was approximately 14 and that she was sold to a brothel and forced into prostitution and that she was forced to marry a stranger.
6.
Somaly Mam left Cambodia for Paris in 1993 where she married a French citizen, Pierre Legros.
7.
Somaly Mam served as an untrained healthcare worker with Medecins Sans Frontieres and, in her spare time, handed out condoms, soap, and information to women in the brothels.
8.
The Somaly Mam Foundation attracted the support of US business leaders and Hollywood stars.
9.
SMF was the global fundraising arm of Somaly Mam's Phnom Penh-based AFESIP.
10.
Somaly Mam resigned from her position and later the foundation shut down in October 2014.
11.
Posts on the group's Facebook page suggest that Somaly Mam is still heavily involved, and McCord insists that Somaly Mam is a "survivor" and appears to absolve her of wrongdoing, while stating that neither Together1heart nor AFESIP has made changes as a result of the 2014 public relations crisis.
12.
Scrutiny of Somaly Mam's story began with comments she made at the United Nations.
13.
Somaly Mam has since admitted that this was "inaccurate" and that the Cambodian army had not killed eight girls.
14.
The US Ambassador at the time, Joseph Mussomeli, wrote in a diplomatic cable in 2004 that Somaly Mam claimed that Somaly Mam's daughter had been "lured by her peers" to Battambang Province and that she was later found in a night club there in the company of three men who were arrested and charged with trafficking.
15.
In October 2014 the Cambodian government announced that Somaly Mam would be prohibited from operating an NGO, but days later appeared to withdraw the prohibition.