TheTrenchcoat Chronicles

Tag: california

  • Pedo posts ad on craigslist

    Man charged with seeking guide to child sex in Thailand:

    51-year-old Michael Patrick Mahoney of Santa Barbara, California was arrested for advertising on craigslist that he needed a child sex tour guide for Thailand.

    A federal agent posed as the tour guide. Mahoney was arrested at LAX after he boarded a flight to Bangkok. He was found with stuffed toys, candy, and other ‘treats’ for his victims.

    Mahoney is looking at 30 years in federal prison.

    I wonder what section of craigslist he posted his ad in. Hmmmmmmmm.

  • Felon accused of pimping out children

    Man accused of running child prostitution scheme:

    28-year-old convicted felon Aaron Pierre Brown of Hayward, California is accused of pimping out two teenage girls on craigslist. The girls had been in an L.A. area group home. Brown allegedly beat the girls and took explicit photos of them for the craigslist ads.

    Yet some people who want to be able to pay for sex will argue that these two girls aren’t victims of prostitution.

  • Human trafficking in El Dorado Hills

    El Dorado Man Charged With Sex Trafficking:

    23-year-old Rishi Sanwal was arrested on Monday on charges of sex trafficking. Sanwal was allegedly prostituting a missing teen from El Dorado Hills, California. After the teen disappeared she called a friend. Police were able to use the caller ID to trace the number back to some hooker ads placed on craigslist.

    Undercover cops set up a meeting and were able to rescue the teen and arrest Sanwal.

    So a teenage girl being held against her will and prostituted couldn’t possibly be considered a victim could she?

  • L.A. area predator indicted

    Sex Predator Uses MySpace to Lure Teens:

    33-year-old Gregory Scott Serrano of Monrovia, California has been indicted for using MySpace to prey on underage girls. He’s accused of having sex or taking explicit photos of at least 10 victims. Authorities believe that there may be even more victims.

    He’s been charged with…

    …production of child pornography, using the Internet to entice minors to produce child pornography and to meet for sex, receipt of child pornography, possession of child pornography and attempted destruction of evidence.

    Serrano was investigated when a 15-year-old victim came forward. It’s alleged that Serrano posed as a 19-year-old on MySpace to lure his victims.

    And the cherry on this scumbag sundae?

    After his March 12 arrest, Serrano allegedly contacted a family member and asked the relative to retrieve and hide a compact disc stashed inside a rollerblade in Serrano’s basement.

    The FBI recovered the disc, who allegedly contained logs of e-mail conversations between Serrano and his victims, as well as child pornography depicting them

    I’m sure I’ll still get comments telling me what a great guy he is and how he was framed.

    Serrano could get life behind bars.

  • The victimless crime in Sacramento

    Underage prostitutes marketed on Internet:

    This is a great article from the Sacramento Bee about child prostitution on craigslist. Again it’s not worth quoting the article much because doing to so would insult the journalists who worked on it but I will give you two quotes that will get you to read the entire article.

    The first is just the opening sentence of the article…

    If she tried hard, 14-year-old Jasmine could have sex with nine men a day. She’d start posting ads online at 2 or 3 p.m., in time to set up appointments with early commuters.

    And as usual the craigslist big wigs had their usual non-response…

    Jim Buckmaster, craigslist’s CEO, wrote in an e-mail to The Bee that “there is nothing more gut-wrenching to our staff … than to hear that our site has been abused to exploit a child.”

    He said craigslist bans illegal activity and urges users to watch for exploited minors. Staff recently implemented new measures, including verifying phone numbers. The changes have reduced the volume of erotic services ads by 80 percent, he said.

    I guess we have to go through this again.

    First off if it was so gut-wrenching to craigslist they would do away with the erotic services section. Secondly again ‘users’ policing the site obviously doesn’t work. Like I’ve said many times before the users of the erotic services section aren’t going to flag any of the ads and users who use craigslist for normal stuff aren’t going in to the erotic services section to flag illegal ads. Lastly craigslist’s new measures may have eliminated 80 percent of the erotic ads but it hasn’t eliminated the problem of child prostitution on its site.

    Stop patting yourself on the back Jim, you’re part of the problem, not the solution.

  • Victimless in Vallejo

    Mother, Son Accused Of Pimping 15-Year Old Girl. Girl Allegedly Pimped Out To More Than 1200 Men:

    37-year-old Lavern Vaughn and her son, 20-year-old Lavor Carter, of Vallejo, California have been arrested for pimping out a 15-year-old girl. The pair posted almost 700 ads on craigslist pimping the girl out in Northern California.

    The victim couldn’t just leave either…

    The federal indictment alleges carter would whip her with a belt and plastic rod, burn her with a lighter, or strike her. She reportedly tried to leave Carter on multiple occasions, but he told her that if she left, she would not leave alive.

    In the same indictment, Carter allegedly duct taped the minor to a chair inside an apartment and left her there for 12 hours. Other accusations include pouring boiling water on her leg and chest, and locking her in a garage all night long.

    If this story couldn’t be any sicker read what the suspects’ relative said when confronted by the media…

    We asked Gail Vaughn, mother and grandmother of the woman and young man arrested by FBI agents, if they were really pimping out a young girl. “No,” she said. “The girl they’re accused of pimping [isn’t] a kid. She’s 16 and has a two-year old daughter.”

    But she’s still a minor under the law. “Yeah, but we didn’t know that.”

    Who the hell doesn’t know that minors are under 18 and why is that supposed to make a difference?

    And that’s right I said victim. You can take your victimless crime and shove it.

  • craigslist child prostitution in the Bay Area

    Technology helps fuel ‘pimping’ of young girls:

    This is a very powerful article about a case of child prostitution in the Bay Area that was in part facilitated by craigslist.

    I would do the story and its author a great injustice if I tried to either quote or summarize the story. That’s how good I think it is.

    For those of you who think that child prostitution is not happening on craigslist you need to read this article.

    And again for those of you that think prostitution is a victimless crime you need to read this article.

  • The victimless crime in Sacramentio

    Local Woman Charged With Pimping Juveniles:

    22-year-old Felisha Mock of Sacramento, California has been arrested for pimping out girls as young as 16 over craigslist.

    Investigators tell CBS13 that Mock set up the ring using Craigslist. The way it worked is the teenagers would allegedly solicit sex to customers, and investigators say Mock’s customers would then broker a deal over the phone getting a percentage of the sale.

    Some neighbors aren’t surprised because they say drug addiction is a big problem in this neighborhood.

    “And they need their drugs so they need to make money. They’re not going to work because they can’t pee in a cup,” says Carol.

    But they all must have entered prostitution voluntarily because people keep telling me it’s a victimless crime.

  • California man arrested in sex sting

    Benjamin Dennis
    Benjamin Dennis

    Corning man apprehended in MySpace sex sting:

    32-year-old Benjamin Dennis of Corning, California was arrested for trying to solicit sex from a 13-year-old over the internet. Except that the 13-year-old was actually an investigator from the Tehama County district attorney’s office.

    The fake 13-year-old even has its own MySpace.

    And lose the soul patch you tool.

  • Dyleski sentence appeal

    Dyleski sentence appeal

    Scott Dyleski files appeal of life sentence for murder conviction:

    The attorneys for Scott Dyleski are trying the spaghetti plan to get their client out of a life sentence without parole. By spaghetti plan, I mean they’re throwing everything against the wall to see what sticks.

    Scott Dyleski was the 16-year-old who was tried as an adult, convicted, and sentenced to life without parole in the murder of Pam Vitale. Vitale was the wife of famous criminal defense attorney Daniel Horowitz.

    One of the focuses on the trial was that some people felt trying Dyleski as an adult was inhumane, and that sentencing him to life without parole was worse. I’m not one of those people. He brutally bludgeoned Pam Vitale and carved a symbol in her back. If that doesn’t warrant being tried as an adult, nothing does.

    Anyway, on to the matter at hand, his appeal.

    Scott Dyleski’s sentence of life without the possibility of parole in the October 2005 bludgeoning death of Lafayette resident Pamela Vitale amounts to unconstitutional cruel and unusual punishment because he was only 16 at the time, his lawyer argued in a court appeal this week.

    The 183-page brief, filed Wednesday in state appeals court, also argues that there was not enough evidence during the trial of burglary — the special circumstance that allowed Judge Barbara Zuniga to sentence Dyleski to life without parole.

    The judge also should have allowed a change of court venue because of the local notoriety; held a hearing on the reliability of DNA testing that linked Dyleski to the murder; and should have thrown out evidence from a home search that attorney Philip Brooks claims was based on a “recklessly inaccurate” search warrant affidavit, the brief argues.

    Is there anything else? Can we get you a coffee or something? Did you not care for the color of the bailiff’s uniform? Were the courtroom chairs too stiff for you?

    If Dyleski was 21 when he killed Pam Vitale this wouldn’t even be an issue, but some people just have to do things “for the children”. Even if those children are cold-blooded and callous killers.