Two Miami-Dade Brothers Arrested For Human Trafficking, Forcing 16-Year-Old Runaway Teen To Have Sex With Over A Dozen Men Per Day

Two Miami-Dade brothers were arrested for kidnapping, drugging, and forcing a 16-year-old runaway teen girl to have sex with over a dozen men per day.

According to Miami Herald, the runaway teen is now safe after she was able to escape and run to safety. The two Miami brothers who kidnapped the teen, Bogacski Thomas and Tavarus Ballard, – both age 24 – were arrested March 3. They both face a slew of charges, such as human trafficking, robbery, and drug possession.

An arrest affidavit stated that “Thomas and Ballard met their victim on January 9th. She ran away from her home after a fight with her mom. The State Attorney says the brothers preyed on her vulnerability and used her to make money. The money collected would pay for their hotel, food and drugs — drugs that they forced the teen to take.”

According to NBC Miami, to have full and complete control over the runaway teen, the Miami-Dade brothers drugged her with ecstasy, cocaine, and marijuana. They would put the drugs in her food and cigarettes so that she wouldn’t know she was consuming drugs.

Miami-Dade state attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle confirmed that “they gave her cocaine. They gave her marijuana. Sometimes they put it in her food.”

Since the runaway teen was their only source of income, they abused her and threatened her so that she would “have sex with men for money in order to be able to pay for the hotels, and for them to eat.”

Rundle later added the following.

“That is a man every 30 minutes from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. at night; only to repeat itself the next day and the next day.”

“She to them was nothing more than a walking machine.”

“No dignity, not a human being, not a young girl, a cash machine. That’s how these predators look at them.”

“Every time she tried to escape, they would beat her up, they would grab her back. In one case, they actually picked her broken body up and took her back up into the motel.”

According to an affidavit, “Thomas told the victim that if she tried to leave they knew where her family lived and they would shoot up her house and hurt or kill her family.”

Due to the new laws of human trafficking, the Miami-Dade brothers may face up to life in prison if convicted.

They are currently being held at the county jail without bond.

[Image courtesy of Imagens Evangelicas/Flickr]