A Virginia jury has rejected the claims of a Costa Rican woman who accused a police chief and three officers of conspiring to protect a sex trafficking ring that she said threatened to harm her family if she escaped.
An eight-person civil jury in Alexandria found that the woman was not a victim of trafficking but a volunteer sex worker. Once that conclusion was reached, jurors did not have to challenge the officers’ alleged involvement in protecting the prostitution ring.
The officers sued included former Fairfax County Sheriff Edwin Roessler, James Baumstark, a former captain who is now a deputy chief in Asheville, North Carolina, and officers Michael Barbazette and Jason Mardocco. The woman claimed that Roessler protected the human trafficking ring in northern Virginia until the FBI disarmed it in 2019.
TEXAS MAN CONFESSES BEADING HIS ‘UNDOCUMENTED’ NEWLY MARRIED WIFE: REPORT
Fairfax County Police Chief Edwin Roessler briefs reporters on reports of a gunman entering the USA Today headquarters building on August 7, 2019 in McLean, Virginia. -The trafficking ring named the former police chief and three other officers as clients who allowed the company to operate.
(Evelyn Hockstein/For The Washington Post via Getty Images)
The officers denied the claims. Barbazette and Mardocco admitted to being clients of the ringleader, Hazel Sanchez, and resigned from the police after their phone numbers were found on Sanchez’s phone.
The woman, identified in court documents as Jane Doe, claimed she was lured to the United States from Costa Rica in 2010 with promises of work as a nanny, housekeeper and high-level escort. She said that she was told that having sex with clients was not mandatory.
She said she was forced to perform sexual acts with up to 17 men a day and that Sánchez kept her employed by confiscating her passport and threatening to harm her family if she ran away. Defense attorneys noted that the woman traveled to Costa Rica between 2010 and 2015 and returned to Sánchez each time. She said that she did so out of fear for the safety of her family.
“She is willing to say whatever it takes to get what she wants at that moment,” Kim Baucom, an attorney for two of the officers, said in her closing statement.
The woman claimed officers obstructed efforts to investigate and prosecute Sanchez.
Taking the stand, the woman collapsed while testifying about the degrading sexual acts Sanchez forced her to perform on clients under threats and said the officers failed in their duties by not breaking the ring.
“They had to protect us,” Doe said of the officers, according to The Washington Post. “They didn’t have to be the customers. They didn’t have to protect Hazel’s ring.”
Deputy Chief James “Jim” Baumstark began work with the Asheville Police Department (APD) on November 9, 2015. Prior to his arrival, he served with the Fairfax County Police Department (FCDP) in Fairfax, Virginia for more than 26 years.
(City of Asheville)
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
However, defense attorneys pointed to an email exchange between Doe and Sanchez before she arrived in the US, in which they discussed the fees men would be charged on dates. Defense attorneys said the discussion of hourly rates did not comport with Doe’s assertion that she was promised high-end escort work, would date wealthy clients, and would only have sex if she wanted to.
Sánchez was convicted of running the prostitution ring and sentenced to 2.5 years in prison.
Associated Press and Fox News’ Danielle Wallace contributed to this report.
