A Central Florida couple was arrested on Wednesday (July 19) after being accused of trafficking young women they bailed out of jails around the area.
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The suspects have been identified as 34-year-old Joselito Martinez Gonzalez and 30-year-old Tanya Wurster, of Marion County. They both are facing felony charges for human trafficking.
According to local law enforcement officials, the couple is accused of trafficking at least three young women between 2019 and 2021. The Metropolitan Bureau of Investigation (MBI) claimed that the couple kept up a ploy that involved them bailing young women out of jails, then giving them a place to live, before advertising them online to potential buyers.
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The women were then allegedly forced to engage in “commercial sex acts with customers,” allowing the couple to make upwards of $300,000 over two years from the three victims.
The MBI also claimed that Martinez Gonzalez would keep the victims in line via “narcotics, threats of violence, and humiliating acts such as shaving the victim’s head to control them.” Investigators also said that he had forced two of the women to accept tattoos, as a way of “branding them as his property.”
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The MBI even claimed that Martinez Gonzalez and Wurster share a minor child together, and that they lived in the couple’s home, along with the trafficking victims, where all of the alleged prostitution acts were happening.
The MBI stated the child “was often present in the home while the commercial sex dates were occurring.” Investigators also said that they believe there are additional victims as the Florida couple was constantly on the hunt for new victims.
Martinez Gonzalez and Wurster have been booked into the Orange County Jail and will be facing prosecution from the Florida Attorney General’s Office. Furthermore, a judge has set Martinez Gonzalez’s bond at $45,000 and ordered that he have no contact with any of the victims.
Meanwhile, the MBI is continuing their investigation and urging the public to come forward with any information they may have about other victims, or additional information about the defendants’ criminal acts.
Elsewhere, it was reported via records from the Florida Department of Corrections that the Florida couple was previously arrested for scheming.
Martinez Gonzalez previously spent three years in prison for conspiracy to commit organized fraud of $50,000 or more, as part of an unemployment benefit scam. Wurster was also caught up in the scheme. Records show that she was sentenced to 18 months in prison for her role.
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