WASHINGTON, April 7, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Justice
Department announced today that Brian Forbes of Hartford, Conn., was
sentenced today to 156 months in prison for his involvement in a sex
trafficking ring that victimized minor girls and coerced young women to
engage in commercial sex acts against their will. Forbes was also ordered
to serve 3 years of supervised release and to pay $16,339 in restitution to
his victims. Forbes was charged in a 64-count superseding indictment, along
with nine other co-defendants, on Aug. 8, 2006. Mr. Forbes pleaded guilty
on March 4, 2007, to three counts of sex trafficking of minors, two counts
of sex trafficking adult women (through force, fraud, or coercion) and one
count of conspiracy to use interstate facilities to promote prostitution.
Evidence presented at the plea hearing revealed that Brian Forbes found
and enticed young females, including minors, from states adjacent to
Connecticut, and used a variety of threats to force the young women into
providing sexual services to the ring's clients in and around Hartford,
Conn. Forbes used a variety of unlawful means to force the victims to
repeatedly provide sexual services to the ring's clients. Those means
included physical threats and unlawful restraint.
Eight others, including co-defendant Shanaya Hicks, also pleaded guilty
in this case. On April 1, 2007, Hicks was sentenced to 46 months in prison.
Co-defendant Dennis Paris was convicted at trial in June of 2007 for sex
trafficking of minors, sex trafficking of adults (through force, fraud, and
coercion), conspiracy, use of an interstate facility to promote
prostitution, and money laundering. Paris is scheduled to be sentenced on
April 14, 2008.
"The defendant used sexual assaults, beatings, and lies to force young
women and girls into prostitution in Connecticut. He was one of a chain of
people who brutally exploited these women," said Grace Chung Becker, Acting
Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department's Civil Rights
Division. "Today's sentence, like those of his co-defendants, sends a
strong message that those who hold and brutalize others in sex trafficking
rings will be apprehended and punished."
"The lengthy prison term imposed today is an appropriate one for an
individual who victimized minors and enslaved women, forcing them to commit
sexual acts against their will and under the threat of violence," stated
Nora R. Dannehy, Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Connecticut.
Human trafficking prosecutions such as this one are a top priority of
the Department of Justice. In the last seven fiscal years, the Civil Rights
Division, in conjunction with the U.S. Attorneys Offices, has increased by
nearly seven-fold the number of human trafficking cases filed in court as
compared to the previous seven fiscal years. In FY 2007, the Department
obtained a record number of convictions in human trafficking prosecutions.
This case was investigated by a law enforcement task force lead by
Detective Deborah Scates of the Hartford Police Department, Sergeant Chris
McKee of the Windsor Police Department, Special Agent Chris Grispino of the
Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Special Agent Douglas Werth of the
Internal Revenue Service. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S.
Attorney Jim Genco and Special Litigation Counsel Andrew J. Kline of the
Department of Justice's Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit.
SOURCE U.S. Department of Justice
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