"Jamaica Plain woman charged with sex trafficking; Accused of aiding pimp in running prostitution ring" by Milton J. Valencia | Globe staff May 24, 2014
To prosecutors, she was central to a massive sex-trafficking network, an organizer who once transported a minor from Maine to California to have her engage in prostitution.
But a defense lawyer called Jacquelyn R. Lungelow a victim herself, who was controlled by the same violent pimp who prosecutors have described in court records.
“You can see she was afraid he was going to kill her, and she’s still afraid of him,” her lawyer, Mark W. Shea, told US Magistrate Judge Judith G. Dein.
The two contrasting views of Lungelow, of Jamaica Plain, were presented during a detention hearing in federal court in Boston Friday to determine whether the 26-year-old woman should be released on bail pending a sex trafficking trial.
Dein indicated that she will release Lungelow to the custody of her mother, possibly with the requirement that she wear an electronic monitoring bracelet. The judge continued the hearing until Tuesday so that she could better analyze Lungelow’s possible living conditions.
Lungelow was named in a 17-count indictment last week charging five people with running an interstate sex trafficking operation, mostly from Maine to Boston. She faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison on the charge she transported a minor to California. Authorities in Los Angeles found the minor in a hotel room after responding to an advertisement offering sex for a fee.
Lungelow also allegedly rented hotels in Rhode Island that would be used for the sex trafficking operation, prosecutors said.
The alleged leader of the ring is Raymond Jeffries, who goes by the rap name Skame Dollarz, a 26-year-old who lists addresses in Boston and Portland. Authorities say he and other pimps traded prostitutes and transported them from state to state to offer them for sex for a fee. The pimps would advertise the services on websites and take the women to hotel rooms.
Jeffries faces a minimum of 15 years in prison on some charges. Authorities also charged Corey Norris, 23, of Boston; Kairis Sanchez, 19, of Boston; and John Kanda, 21, of Maine.
Federal prosecutors have focused their efforts in recent years on criminals who have turned to sex trafficking operations, finding it less likely that they would be arrested.
There is also less competition than in the drug trade, and it can be a lucrative business, according to an account by Stacy Fleischman, special agent with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations unit.
“Sex trafficking is the fastest-growing industry in organized crime,” Fleischman wrote in an affidavit, adding that “law enforcement has only just begun to catch up to the magnitude of the problem.”
A Malden man pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to sex trafficking a 15-year-old girl. David Minasian, 25, faces 13 to 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. He is slated to be sentenced in October.
Also, Michael Gemma, 30, of Dorchester was found guilty by a federal jury Tuesday of sex trafficking a 16-year-old girl. He is to be sentenced in September and faces a minimum sentence of 15 years in prison.
That's consensual in Massachusetts.
Related:
It’s Now OK for the Government to Operate Child Porn Websites | Just Thought You’d Like to Know
How the FBI Uses Rapists and Child Molesters to Entrap Gullible People in Terror Stings
That sure is what it is starting to look like, what with the NSA watching everything.
Lungelow allegedly played the role of a coordinator in Jeffries’ organization. Authorities alleged she was a former prostitute who had a romantic relationship with Jeffries and had a child with him.
In more recent years, once she learned the operation, her status was elevated so that she would recruit prostitutes, advertise their services, and coordinate hotel plans.
“She was actively involved, not just as a prostitute,” said Assistant US Attorney Amy H. Burkart, adding that the role “really is integral to the sex trafficking operation.”
“She has the capacity to commit these crimes on her own,” Burkart said.
But Shea said that Lungelow was very much subjected to the same punishment and control that Jeffries allegedly handed out to the prostitutes, and he had more control once they had a child together.
Lungelow tried to end her relationship with Jeffries in 2013 and obtained a restraining order against him, Shea said. Jeffries was arrested for violating the order last year.
“This guy used everyone,” Shea said.
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"Child porn investigation nets 200" by Alicia A. Caldwell | Associated Press, January 04, 2013
WASHINGTON — More than 200 adults have been arrested in an international investigation of child pornography, Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Thursday.
The agency’s director, John Morton, said 123 child victims were identified during the five-week investigation, which ended in early December. Customs officials and local authorities found 110 victims in 19 US states, while the others were living in six other countries.
Morton declined to provide specific details about which foreign countries were involved, saying only that there were some cases in Mexico.
The investigation, dubbed ‘‘Operation Sunflower,’’ was part of Immigration and Customs’s effort to find and rescue victims, and to arrest abusers and people who make or transmit child pornography.
‘‘We have to attack child exploitation relentlessly and together. There is no other way, there is no other answer,’’ Morton said. ‘‘It is a wrong among wrongs. We are literally defending the defenseless.’’
Unless it is the elite doing it; then it is enabled and covered up.
Morton also announced arrest warrants for two unidentified adults charged in Los Angeles with molesting a girl who appeared in online photos to be about 13 when she was abused. The man and woman were identified only as ‘‘John Doe’’ and ‘‘Jane Doe’’ and authorities believe they may have been in the San Fernando Valley area north of Los Angeles when they abused the girl....
The victims ranged in age from less than 1 to 17 years old....
Among those arrested was a court security officer and formerly a reserve police officer in Michigan....
Eat it up with this.
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Related: Man gets 10-year sentence in second child porn case
