After Sex Trafficking, Prostitution Busts, Sheriff Calls On Escort Websites To Help

MAYWOOD, IL — Four people who are accused of operating brothels in Palatine Township and Kane County are among the 10 defendants charged in connection with trafficking related investigations by the Cook County sheriff's police over a two-week period, according to the sheriff's office.

Christian Hurtado, 28, of Elgin; Daniel Hurtado, 26, of Elgin; Martha Hurtado-Hernandez, 57, of Chicago, and Rigoberto Parra, 46, of Aurora, were indicted by a Cook County grand jury on Oct. 6 on charges of involuntary servitude, trafficking in persons and promoting prostitution.

Investigators from the sheriff's police vice unit found they had been operating a brothel in an apartment in the 1500 block of Norway Lane in unincorporated Palatine. All four are also facing charges of operating a sex trafficking ring in various Kane County locations.

Between February and July of this year, they are accused of conspiring to traffic seven women from South America, physically restrain them in a home and threatened them if they did not engage in prostitution, Patch previously reported.

Sheriff Tom Dart held a news conference Monday to announce recent charges and call on websites containing prostitution advertisements to cooperate with law enforcement.

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Dart said the internet had led to a dramatic increase in sex trafficking and the spread of child sexual abuse material. He said the number of vice unit arrests his office could make was only limited by available personnel.

"Clearly, there's literally no conceivable way we're going to arrest our way out of this. It's not going to happen," Dart said. "No matter how many people I get, no matter how many ads we put up on these sites, it's not going to change."

Other recent arrests Dart's office announced include Carlos Cooks, 53, of Elk Grove Village, who was charged with involuntary servitude and promoting prostitution on Oct. 6 after an investigation determined that he placed online ads for a victim, arranged encounters with men, controlled her finances and physically abused her if she did not have sex for money.

Erick Johnson, 24, of Chicago, was indicted Oct. 13 on charges of involuntary servitude of a minor and promoting juvenile prostitution for trafficking a minor online. Johnson was already awaiting trial on charges of promoting prostitution of someone else at the time of his indictment, according to the sheriff's office.

Not all the trafficking charges announced by the sheriff's office were sex-related.

Jaime Olvera-Lopez, 52, and Leticia Pena, 57, forced a person to work against their will at an unspecified Cicero restaurant owned by the brother and sister. The pair have both been charged with trafficking in persons, while Pena is also charged with involuntary servitude.

According to the sheriff's office, half of its recent cases involved victims who were advertised through the websites Listcrawler or MegaPersonals.

Dart said he planned to send letters to both websites asking them to cooperate with his office's trafficking prevention efforts. He said, as far as he knew, neither site has provided any cooperation to any law enforcement agencies.

"And if you were to go to any of their sites right now, there's literally no mystery what's going on at the sites," he said. "None whatsoever."

In his letter, Dart said he would ask the website operators to alter their sites, implement "better filters" and hire more people, if necessary, to screen for trafficking victims and forward them to law enforcement.

The sheriff said the situation reminded him of his successful yearslong efforts to shut down the website Backpage, which was seized by federal authorities in 2018. He noted that several company officials are currently facing charges related to facilitating prostitution and money laundering in Arizona.

A 2021 Government Accountability Office report cited a 2019 FBI document concluding that the FBI's ability to identify and locate sex trafficking victims and perpetrators was significantly decreased following Backpage's seizure.

FBI officials said this is due to law enforcement's familiarity with the site and its operators were responsive to legal inquiries, whereas platforms located overseas may be much more difficult, the report said.

According to domain information, one of the websites cited by Dart is registered in Luxumberg and another is registered anonymously through a Portuguese service.