A Blaine man accused of serving as the Minnesota manager for an international sex-trafficking ring that exploited vulnerable, foreign-born women from China admitted to his role in the criminal operation during a Friday court hearing.
After reaching a plea deal with prosecutors on the case, Dongzhou Jiang, 29, pleaded guilty in Washington County District Court to one count of felony-level racketeering and another count of felony-level sex trafficking, according to the Ramsey County attorney’s office.
Both Ramsey and Washington county authorities led the investigation into the illicit business, which was reportedly based out of California but had service areas in regions throughout the United States, including the metro area, legal documents say.
Jiang faced six felonies before reaching an agreement with the state.
His attorney, Tyler Bliss, declined to comment on Jiang’s decision to admit his involvement.
Per the terms of his deal, Jiang is expected to be sentenced to between 3.5 and 5 years in prison and will be mandated to turn over all the cash he made from the business, authorities say.
Two other defendants in the case, Fangyao Wu, 23, of Irvine Calif., and her mother, Hong Jing, 48, have also pleaded guilty to roles in the operation. Wu entered her plea earlier this month to one count of racketeering. Jing pleaded guilty Monday morning to felony-level counts of racketeering and aiding and abetting sex-trafficking.
One other who was also charged, Sophia Wang Navas, 49, also from California, has yet to a enter a plea.
County attorneys for both Washington and Ramsey said in a statement last week that they are “very pleased” with the outcome of the cases to date.
“As this case continues forward against the remaining … (defendant), and as other separate investigations are pursued by our offices, we are convinced more than ever that multi-jurisdictional partnerships between prosecutors and law enforcement like this one are critical in stopping these types of far-reaching human trafficking schemes operating throughout our state and region,” Ramsey County John Choi said in the prepared statement.
Jing and Navas, whom Jiang described in court as his “boss ladies,” are suspected of orchestrating the sex-trafficking ring from their base in California, placing ads for the women lured into the complex enterprise, mostly from China, and communicating with clients who wanted to pay them for sex.
The operation ran from February 2015 until February 2017 and involved nearly 20,000 advertisements for sexual services placed on Backpage.com, charges say.
In describing the ring last winter, Orput pointed to a bust made at a Cottage Grove home in February to serve as an example of how it worked. He said enforcement found little more than two mattresses inside the townhouse along with “a line of men” waiting to have sex with three women found inside the home.
Jiang coordinated the logistics of the operation in Minnesota and North Dakota, finding establishments and private homes for the women to work out of and collecting the money paid to them by clients, the complaint said.
He told officers that the women, who ranged in age from 32 to 45, were forced to earn at least $800 a day or risk getting fired, authorities say. He also said they had to pay for housing, transportation and food.
Most of the women were foreign born, mainly Chinese nationals. Locally, they served clients across the Twin Cities, including Oakdale, Cottage Grove, St. Paul, Blaine, Maplewood and St. Louis Park.
Jiang typically rotated the women’s location every two weeks, he told police, according to the complaint. He admitted that women were sometimes raped, beaten and robbed at gunpoint by clients.
He referred to the incidents as “just part of the business,” the complaint said.
Investigators say they discovered tens of thousands of dollars in traffickers’ bank accounts. One account contained more than $850,000.
None of the trafficked women initially identified by investigators in the case wanted help or services, authorities say. Orput added that all the women involved were isolated, spoke little to no English and were fully dependent upon the traffickers. He also said they may have feared deportation for going against their traffickers.
Jiang is expected to be sentenced in December.