GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — A woman told police she escaped from a Grand Rapids home, where she was held against her will and forced into prostitution by another woman who promised her work as a housekeeper.
The disturbing details are contained in court documents and transcripts accusing 36-year-old Aura Marina Gonzalez-Velasquez of human trafficking and keeping a house of prostitution.
As police investigated the mid-September allegations, a man approached the house and “stated he was there to try to get a sex date,’’ court records show.
Grand Rapids police last month received a 9-1-1 call from a woman who told the dispatcher she had just escaped from a home on Griggs Street SE where she had been held against her will and forced into prostitution for the past month, court records show.
The caller also claimed that there was another woman being held against her will.
Police went to the home on Griggs near South Division Avenue and made contact with three people, including Gonzalez-Velasquez. They did not find anyone being held against their will.
The victim said Gonzalez-Velasquez promised her work as a housekeeper. She was brought from Houston to Grand Rapids and kept “under threats by another individual, a male, to do sex dates for money for the past month until she was able to escape’’ on Sept. 14, court records show.
Gonzalez-Velasquez consented to a search of her Griggs Street home, which turned up “evidence of scantily-clad women on her phone,’’ court records show.
Those images are “the type of photographs that you would normally see advertised online for sex date activity,’’ Grand Rapids police officer Jeffrey Bouma told a judge during a warrant request.
Inside the house, “we found an area described by the victim, a mattress laying on the floor with lotions, and other feminine products that she described,’’ Bouma testified during the Sept. 16 appearance.
The victim told police the area was used for sex dates “on a regular basis.’’
Even as the mid-September investigation was underway, a man knocked on the door and “stated he was there to try to get a sex date,’’ Bouma told Grand Rapids District Court Judge Jeanine N. LaVille.
“He said he had a phone number on a card in his pocket,’’ Bouma said. “That phone number matches numerous cards that were found in that address during the consent search.’’
The man told police that “numerous construction workers that he works with go to that house to complete sex dates on a regular basis,’’ court records show.
A warrant was signed Sept. 16 charging Gonzalez-Velasquez with human trafficking – forced labor resulting in injury/commercial sexual activity. The offense is punishable by up to 15 years in prison and a $15,000 fine.
She is also charged with keeping a house of prostitution, which is punishable by a five-year term.
Gonzalez-Velasquez, who was flagged as a flight risk, is being held in the Kent County Jail on a $250,000 bond. She has a preliminary examination scheduled for Oct. 21 in Grand Rapids District Court.
Kent County Prosecutor Chris Becker says his office has filed six human trafficking cases in the last decade. The case against Gonzalez-Velasquez is the first such case to be filed in 2019, he said.
“They’re always difficult cases,’’ Becker said. “There is no community that’s immune.’’
Other headlines from 13 ON YOUR SIDE:
RELATED VIDEO:
►Make it easy to keep up to date with more stories like this. Download the 13 ON YOUR SIDE app now.
Have a news tip? Email news@13onyourside.com, visit our Facebook page or Twitter. Subscribe to our YouTube channel.