Man convicted of luring girls into prostitution by offering drugs, shelter

Almost two years to the day after Mark Delroy Daley pressured them into prostitution, three teenage girls Wednesday turned the tables on the one-time pimp.

"Don't pretend you're not scared, because I can tell you are," one girl said, angrily confronting him in Sonoma County Superior Court, "because you know that we have more power than you now. You're a monster."

A judge convicted Daley, 43, last month of inducing the girls into prostitution for money, drugs and lodging over a two-week period in April 2003.

At his formal sentencing next week, Daley faces as many as 19 years in prison. He will have to register for the rest of his life as a sex offender, Deputy District Attorney Marianna Lehr said.

The victims, now 16 and working and attending school, spoke as part of the victim-impact portion of his sentencing.

One of the girls asked Daley to look at her while she spoke, but h e avoided her glare, crossing his arms and clenching his teeth.

"You are the most disgusting, hurtful, hateful person I've ever known," she said. "I hope you stay in jail for a long time. You disgust me. You're an evil person. You're weak. How could you? It's terrible what you've done."

Her sister, the third victim, said even the maximum sentence wouldn't be enough to repay Daley for the damage he caused.

"He's someone who would take your 14-year-old daughter and take away her childhood," she said. "What gives someone the right to take two years of your life? It's not fair, it's not right and he should get punished."

Two of the girls had run away from their Santa Rosa homes on April 3, 2003, and encountered Daley downtown. Daley persuaded them to have sex with a man in exchange for money, methamphetamine and a place to stay for the night, according to trial testimony.

After briefly returning home, one girl ran away again April 15, joined by her sister. They encountered Daley, this time at a diner on Santa Rosa Avenue. The third girl felt pressured to have sex for money, and received money and drugs for doing so, prosecutors said.

At the same time, Sonoma County law enforcement began responding to complaints of prostitution along Santa Rosa Avenue. As the agencies stepped up enforcement, dozens of johns and prostitutes were taken into custody.

Santa Rosa police knew the unemployed Daley often hung out downtown and lived at motels on Santa Rosa and Cleveland avenues. They began looking into information that he was recruiting 14- to 16-year-old girls for prostitution.

Detectives began taping telephone conversations with Daley in which he agreed to provide teenage girls for sex.

On April 17, police said Daley brought one of the girls to a Rohnert Park motel with the intent of pimping her to a man who turned out to be an undercover detective. He was arrested and charged with pimping.