Thread: PA-5 arrested in Norristown brothel bust

5 arrested in Norristown brothel bust
Thursday, March 04, 2010
john rawlins

NORRISTOWN, Pa. - March 4, 2010 (WPVI) -- Five people are charged in connection with running two brothels in Montgomery County and one of them operated right across from a school.

The alleged crimes took place in 2008 and 2009. The charges were held today because of a similar federal probe.

Authorities say 36-year-old Jose David Castillo, a twice deported Mexican national, ran a 5 man ring of illegal aliens that processed and sold crack cocaine and ran two houses of prostitution in Norristown.


It was a cash rich operation. Its alleged clients would come to one of Castillo's row house brothels, pay $30, and get a ticket. A prostitute who worked in a small, grim room would redeem the tickets for 15 minutes of sex.


Montgomery County district attorney Risa Vetri Ferman said Castillo brought in new women every Monday from out of New York.


"Saturday and Monday being the best days because on Saturday the customers would have more money and on Monday they had a fresh crop of girls, so every week they would start with a fresh crop of girls and they would be working all week long," Ferman said.


Ferman said Castillo's group used intimidation to keep the women, originally from Mexico and Ecuador, from running away.


"The women were brought to the United States illegally; they were often brought in with promises of a better life, promises of employment. They were typically not coming here to be prostitutes," Ferman said.


Various shrines were found, with images of Santa Muerte, the angel of death, said to be the saint of criminals and outcasts. It's thought that Castillo's crew set up the shrines to protect them from being arrested.


Castillo and the four others remain in jail under $50,000 cash bail and federal immigration detainers.


http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?secti ... le-7312569

"The women were brought to the United States illegally; they were often brought in with promises of a better life, promises of employment. They were typically not coming here to be prostitutes," Ferman said.

I say bullsheeeet to that, they knew exactly what work they'd be doing.

With tens of millions of mexican & latin american illegals in this country, news always gets back to the home countries. After all, what kind of "work" can an uneducated, unskilled woman get in the US with the economy the way it is??

Not condoning what the scumbag pimps were doing, but the women need to be processed and deported, they are not victims.

Posted on Fri, Mar. 5, 2010


Alleged drug, prostitution ring busted in Norristown
By Bonnie L. Cook



Detective Vincent Fuentes saw some odd items in May when he searched the Norristown homes of five Mexican nationals suspected of trafficking in cocaine and prostitution.
He found candles and a T-shirt showing Santa Muerte, believed by some to be the patron saint of Mexico's poor, criminals, and outcast. She was depicted as a skeleton draped in black.

"It is believed she hears prayers from the dark," Fuentes said in court papers released yesterday. "If she is in black, the person is praying for protection."

Santa Muerte apparently didn't deliver. The men were arrested last Friday and arraigned yesterday in connection with an alleged drug and prostitution ring that had been operating in Norristown from mid-2008 until May.

The men, who federal officials said had been living in Norristown illegally, were being held at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility with bail set at $50,000 cash bail.

The arraignments were delayed until yesterday so that another case wouldn't be compromised, Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Vetri Ferman said.

Ferman said Jose Castillo, 36, and his brother, Victor Castillo-Perez, 34, had run the prostitution ring in Norristown at 566 Kohn St. and 34 E. Oak St., which is across from an elementary school.

She said Alfredo Hernandez-Garcia, 24, had run the Castillos' alleged cocaine-trafficking business out of 725 Swede St., also near the school.

Ferman identified Louis Gonzales-Sosa, 32, as doorman at the Oak Street house. Eduardo Guzman-Hernandez, 29, was doorman at Kohn Street, she said.

The business drew from women from Mexico and Ecuador who had been forced into prostitution, then routed through New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, Ferman said.

Ferman said the Castillos had picked up the women in New York and driven them to the houses, where they serviced Mexican clients at the rate of $30 a visit.

The doormen kept the women from escaping, she said, and they were threatened with harm, or with being returned to Mexico for killing, if they didn't cooperate. When the women completed a week's work, they were bused back to New York, Ferman said.

"This situation was horribly distressing and frightening for these women," she said. The three women are in the protective custody of federal immigration officials, according to court papers.

Yesterday, Ferman displayed cell phones, drugs wrapped in a diaper, plastic bags, identification papers, and wads of cash seized from the suspects. There were religious icons, but no firearms.

Mark Medvesky, spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said the five men would face deportation once the charges were adjudicated.



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Contact staff writer Bonnie L. Cook at bcook@phillynews.com.


http://www.philly.com/philly/news/local/86506042.html