Sex Trafficking of a Minor: Annandale Man Sentenced to 10 Years

FAIRFAX COUNTY, VA -- Ismael Antonio Mendez, 20, of Annandale, was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison and 10 years of supervised release for sex trafficking of a minor, according to the U.S. Justice Department. Mendez was also ordered to register as a sex offender after he's released from prison.

Mendez pleaded guilty Dec. 29. According to court documents, Mendez admitted that from at least November 2014 through February 2015, he and two adult co-conspirators recruited a 15-year-old girl to engage in commercial sex acts to pay off a debt that Mendez owed to one of the co-conspirators.

The adults taught the girl how to prostitute, took photos of her to use in ads and created commercial sex ads that were posted on the Internet, he admitted. Mendez admitted that the co-conspirators knew that the girl was a minor and instructed her to lie about her age to customers.

According to Mendez’s plea, over a three-month period, the co-conspirators traveled with the girl throughout Virginia, in New York and every state in between for the purposes of advertising and engaging the girl in commercial sex. Mendez admitted that during that time period, the defendants prostituted the girl every day, with an average of 10 to 12 customers a night until she earned enough to repay Mendez’s debt, at which point she was directed to leave the co-conspirators.

Dana J. Boente, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia; Leslie R. Caldwell, Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; Paul M. Abbate, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office; and Colonel Edwin C. Roessler Jr., Chief of the Fairfax County Police Department, made the announcement after sentencing by U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema. Assistant U.S. Attorney Whitney Dougherty Russell and Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Lauren Britsch prosecuted the case.