A Virginia man was sentenced to 25 years in prison Tuesday for sex trafficking two minors, including a missing 14-year-old girl from Colorado.
In June, 32-year-old Denzel Akeem Loftin of Chesapeake, Virginia pleaded guilty to the felony charge of sex trafficking a minor under a plea deal, according to court documents.
The deal dropped four other felony charges from his case, including sex trafficking by force, fraud and coercion; attempted sex trafficking of a minor; production of a visual depiction of a minor engaged in sexually explicit content; and obstruction of a sex trafficking investigation.
While Loftin faced a minimum of 10 years and a maximum of life in prison, on Tuesday, U.S. District Court Judge Elizabeth Hanes sentenced Loftin to 25 years in federal prison with seven years of probation after his release, according to court documents.
Loftin’s accomplice, 24-year-old Emerita Moore of Norfolk, Virginia, was sentenced to five years in jail on Nov. 7 for working as his “bottom” — the female who supervises the girls being trafficked, the release stated.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s office, when Loftin recruited the children online, Moore spoke to them in advance to make them feel comfortable and helped arrange their travel.
Loftin was already on the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s radar in October 2022 when the FBI Norfolk office learned a missing 14-year-old girl from Colorado had been found in multiple sex trafficking advertisements in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia.
FBI agents, working with officers from the Chesapeake Police Department, set up a “date” for commercial sex with the Colorado teenager and another underage girl, a 17-year-old missing from St. Louis, Missouri, according to the affidavit.
When federal agents confronted Loftin, he smashed his cell phone on the ground, preventing agents from extracting anything from the device, according to the affidavit.
However, according to a release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, other electronic devices police confiscated revealed that Loftin not only sex-trafficked the 17-year-old, but also engaged in a sex act with the girl himself.
The Colorado minor also said she witnessed Loftin hurt the 17-year-old, including hitting her in the mouth for “talking back,” the release stated.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to address the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.
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