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Anita Alvarez
Cook County State's Attorney
Communications Department
Chicago, IL 60602
(312) 603-3423
saomedia@cookcountygov.com

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

August 20, 2010

A Chicago man was charged overnight with a range of offenses relating to human trafficking for allegedly operating a prostitution ring in Chicago and suburban Cook County locations in which women were recruited and forced to work as prostitutes, according to the Office of Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez.

Troy Bonaparte, 45, of 8025 S. Ridgeland, Chicago, has been charged with the felony offenses of Involuntary Servitude (Class X felony); Trafficking in Persons for Forced Labor or Services (Class 1 felony); Unlawful Restraint (Class 4 felony); Pandering (Class 4 felony) and two counts of Possession of a Controlled Substance (Class 4 felonies). 

According to prosecutors, Bonaparte targeted and recruited three women in three different neighborhoods in Chicago and the suburbs between May and August of 2010 and put them to work prostituting themselves for his profit.  Bonaparte took sexually provocative photos of the three women and posted the pictures in internet advertisements for escort services.  

Bonaparte, who had the women he was exploiting call him “Magnificent,” would rent motel rooms at various locations in the city and surrounding suburbs where the women would live with him.  The women would sometimes service eight to 12 customers per day and Bonaparte gave them none of the proceeds.  

According to prosecutors, Bonaparte used violence to control the women, beating one of them when she challenged his order.  Two of the women threatened to quit several times but Bonaparte threatened to beat or kill them if they tried to leave, and when one of the women’s families attempted to intervene, he threatened to kill the family as well.  In some cases, if clients offered the women extra money, Bonaparte would order them to perform acts or services they were uncomfortable with, according to prosecutors.

Bonaparte’s operation was uncovered earlier this week when one of the women was discovered by Cook County Sheriff’s Police Vice Officers who were working in an undercover capacity responding to one of Bonaparte’s internet ads at a motel in Elk Grove Village.  Bonaparte was taken into custody Tuesday after being caught in another motel room across the hall with a second woman.  The third woman was located at another nearby motel.  All of the rooms were rented in Bonaparte’s name, according to investigators. 

According to investigators, one of the women had been working for Bonaparte since May, the second had worked for him for approximately two weeks, and the third had worked for him for less than 24 hours. 

When Bonaparte was taken into custody police recovered more than $2,700 in cash, six cameras and a laptop computer in his motel room.  Also recovered were small amounts of crack cocaine and heroin, which were locked in the motel room’s safe.  According to investigators, Bonaparte threw the safe key out of the motel window when police came to the door.

Bonaparte will appear in Central Bond Court today at 11:45 a.m. at the Criminal Courts Building at 26th and California. 

The case is being handled by the State’s Attorney’s Human Trafficking Initiative Unit, which is working in partnership with law enforcement agencies such as the Cook County Sheriff’s Police Department, to combat the problem of domestic human trafficking.  The State’s Attorney’s Human Trafficking Unit has designated prosecutors who are working with law enforcement partners at the federal, state and local level to conduct long-term and proactive investigations.  The office is also working in partnership with social service providers to assist law enforcement and help provide services for children or others who become the victims of human trafficking.

State’s Attorney Alvarez thanked the Cook County Sheriff’s Police and the investigators and prosecutors from the Human Trafficking Unit for their work on the case.

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