[www.miamiherald.com]- A Miami Beach man is accused of running a prostitution ring over the internet in South Florida and Detroit.
Rafael Bernabe-Caballero, 32, was charged Thursday in federal court in Detroit on multiple counts of sex trafficking by force.
An indictment alleges that Bernabe-Caballero operated miamiultimate.com between March 2007 and November 2008, using the website to market Eastern European women for prostitution and to solicit ”johns” around the country.
According to the indictment, Bernabe-Caballero recruited women under the guise of running an escort service and forced them to perform sexual acts on the website’s clients. He allegedly threatened them with physical harm or death.
The website, shut down by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, was relaunched by ICE in an effort to gather more information on potential victims and past clients.
The website now has contact information for the ICE Office of Investigations in Detroit and a federal e-mail address: [email protected].
