New Jersey AG announces arrests in two sex trafficking cases

SOUTH JERSEY (KYW Newsradio) – According to the New Jersey Attorney General, seven people in custody are accused of running two separate human trafficking operations – one in Essex County to the north and another in Cumberland County to the south.

Attorney General Matt Platkin says four men from Bridgeton, Cumberland County, traveled weekly to Queens, New York, and Paterson, New Jersey, to recruit new groups of women under the guise that they were working as “dancers.”

Instead, Platkin says, they were taken to a house on North Laurel Street in Bridgeton that was used as a brothel. After their arrival, the women were forbidden to leave. “And while in the home, the victims also allegedly witnessed violent activity.”

According to the attorney general’s office, police seized quantities of methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana, as well as more than $50,000 in cash from the brothel and from the home of Usiel Luna, 42, the group’s alleged leader.

Luna, as well as Jose Perez-Lopez, 40, Rosendo Vazquez-Hernandez, 35, and Yerson Puentes-Marquez, 28, are charged with human trafficking, drug distribution and several other related offenses.

Platkin says his office has made the fight against human trafficking a top priority and has made more arrests this year than in the total from 2018 to 2022.

“We do this work for the victims, for the survivors, for those who deserve justice and dignity and who deserve to be treated as human beings,” the attorney general said.

Two men and a woman are charged in the Essex County case. Khailah Meekins, 21, and Donte Barkley, 28, both of Newark, New Jersey, are suspected of trafficking two 15-year-old girls and a 13-year-old girl.

Meekins and Barkley were arraigned Monday. According to charging documents, the defendants controlled the teens by whipping them with an electric cord, pulling their hair, biting them and committing other acts of violence

Investigators say nude photos of the girls were used to advertise them online and Barkley arranged their sexual assaults through smartphone apps. The girls were taken to stay with guests in short-term rentals and hotel rooms, where Barkley allegedly told them what to do sexually. He then set the price for customers and ended up receiving a portion of the proceeds from Meekins.

A third suspect, Richard Johnson, 24, of Irvington, New Jersey, was indicted on similar charges in August after he allegedly paid for sex with one of the teens.

The maximum penalties for the most serious crimes, if convicted, are 20 years to life in prison.