Another prostitution case allegedly involving the website Backpage.com has surfaced in federal court in Detroit, Tresa Baldas reports in the Free Press.
Deante Brown, a 26-year-old Detroiter, is in federal detention. [Photo from Fox 2 News]
Deante Brown of Detroit, a 26-year-old convicted carjacker who was a fugtive since 2011, appeared Friday in federal court and consented to detention, the reporter writes.
Baldas describes what led authorities to him this week:
On Tuesday, an undercover agent with the FBI-run Southeast Michigan Crimes Against Children Task Force (SEMCAC) went to the Victory Inn hotel in Southfield after responding to the [Backpage.com] ad featuring [a former EMU student named] April.
The agent met April in a room, where Brown eventually showed up. April told him she had a client. Brown left and planned to return with two more women, “Lexi and Chelsea.” While in the room, April told the undercover agent that “there is a large group of people living at the hotel that are into prostitution and narcotics trafficking.”
Moments later, the agent gave the signal, and a team of officers moved in and took April into custody, along with Brown, who was arrested while walking around the hotel.
At the Southfield Police Department, April told officers that she had been working for a man she knew only as “Blackface,” who turned out to be Brown. She said that “Blackface demanded that she begin working as a prostitute for him,” set up her dates, advertised her on Backpage.com and kept most of her money.
