A Brooklyn man armed with two pistols has been sentenced to 21 years in jail for sex trafficking kidnapped teenagers from his basement apartment.
Identified as 41-year-old Joseph Harris, he was captured in May 2018 for mistreating and threatening young women while forcing them to participate in sexual acts to benefit financially for 10 months, authorities reported.
The subject, known by the pseudonym “Luis Santana”, threatened a victim with his weapon before posting a photo of the event on the social network Instagram, he also dragged another victim across the floor that was soaked with bleach during an altercation by cash.
Harris also had sexual relations with girls as young as 14 while holding them captive inside the residence at St. Mark’s Place in Prospect Heights from July 2017 until the day of his arrest, officials said.
The pimp “fed” the abducted girls multiple drugs, including ecstasy, cocaine, marijuana and pills, investigators said, and forced them to have sex with him while they were not being forced to work.
The operation against Harris was exposed after police received 911 calls reporting minors in the apartment. Officers responded to the scene and found two adult victims along with a 16-year-old girl.
Agents discovered a birth certificate for a 17-year-old girl and hotel receipts at the home, the Daily News reported.
Harris advertised the girls’ availability through social media and the Internet, authorities revealed.
Investigations found that the pimp forced the women to hand over all the money collected from their clients and harshly punished those who tried to keep the cash. Officers also recovered a loaded semi-automatic weapon from his apartment.
Brooklyn US Attorney Breo Peace announced the conviction along with New York FBI Chief Michael Driscoll and New York Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell, thanking the King County District Attorney’s office for their cooperation. .
At the time of Harris’s capture, then-New York Police Director James O’Neill called the crimes “some of the most heinous in our society.”
Keep reading:
- Latino worker charged with child pornography in New Jersey
- Former Democratic and boy scout leader pleaded guilty to child pornography after being caught by the FBI in New York
- Young man distributed child pornography and threatened to kill a girl: accusation in New York