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Queens men sentenced to state prison after forcing runaway teen into prostitution: DA – Metro US

Queens men sentenced to state prison after forcing runaway teen into prostitution: DA

Queens men sentenced to state prison after forcing runaway teen into
Flickr/Michael Coghlan

Two men from Queens will spend the next three to nine years behind bars in a state prison after they allegedly forced a 14-year-old girl into prostitution in 2013, according to authorities.

Lindsay Archibald, 33, of Woodside pleaded guilty in February to sex trafficking and last week was sentenced to three to nine years in prison. Stephen Garrison, 27, of Jamaica also pleaded guilty last month to promoting prostitution and was sentenced Monday to three to six years in prison.

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A third individual, Quanesha Hunte, 25, of Far Rockaway, also pleaded guilty to promoting prostitution last month and was sentence to time serves after being held in Rikers Island for over a year.

All three have been sentenced to serve state prison time, said Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown.

According to prosecutors, the teen victim ran away from her home in September 2013 and a short time later was introduced to the men.

Archibald allegedly told the teen she had to choose which pimp she was going to work for as a prostitute, authorities said.

When the girl refused to choose, the three men threatened her and claimed that she now owed them a large amount of money and that she had to pay them back by performing sex acts for money, which according to prosecutors she allegedly did inside a home on 107th Avenue in Queens.

According to authorities, between Nov. 1, 2013 and Feb. 3, 2014, the teen was kept inside the home against her will by Hunte and Archibald, and forced to have sex with numerous men in exchange for cash – which she then had to turn over to the two men.

During several occasions, the victim allegedly asked if she could stop prostituting herself and told the men she wanted to leave, but Hunte and Archibald instead beat her, prosecutors said. During one incident, Archibald allegedly told the teen, “If you ever try to leave, I’ll find you and kill you.”

Authorities added that in two cases between December 2013 and January 2014, Archibald forced the victim to have sexual intercourse and oral sex with Garrison to test her out in order to see how well she could perform and Garrison allegedly forced himself on her.

On Feb. 3, 2014, Archibald and Hunte moved the victim out of the 107th Avenue location to Hunte’s home, prosecutors said. On that day, the girl was able to use a phone and called her grandmother and 911 for help. The victim told her grandmother that she was being held against her will inside the location and that there was also a gun.

When police arrived at the home in response to the call, they allegedly saw the teen run out crying and upset, authorities said. Inside the home, officers found a Glock handgun inside an open drawer and both Hunte and Garrison were at the location. Archibald arrived shortly after.

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On Feb. 4, 2014, police executed a court-authorized search warrant and discovered the .45 caliber black Glock 21 handgun from the open drawer, authorities said. The handgun was allegedly loaded with a magazine with about eight rounds of ammunition.

“The defendants in this case preyed on a vulnerable teenage girl. They used this child as if she was a commodity to be sold to others for cash – money that they pocketed for themselves,” Brown said. “Sex trafficking is a serious and very disturbing crime that my office continues to vigorously pursue and successfully prosecute.”