A one-day prostitution sting operation run by Santa Rosa police this week resulted in arrests of five women and an Oakland man suspected of human trafficking after he brought an underage girl to an assignation with an undercover officer, authorities said.
Mike Lavella Turner, 19, brought two young women, one 17 and one 20 years old, to a rendezvous with the detective after investigators arranged a meeting online, Sgt. Mike Tosti said.
Meetings were similarly arranged with five other women Tuesday through a variety of online sites, said Tosti, who runs the department's narcotics, domestic violence and sexual assault investigations team.
The division runs undercover prostitution stings periodically, Tosti said, working web sites through which women from around California and out of state advertise their business, sometimes saying they'll be in Santa Rosa on a particular day.
But the priority is always to seek out those who may be trafficking in underage girls, Tosti said.
Turner was in a parking lot outside a Santa Rosa hotel when the older of his female companions solicited sex with an undercover officer, Tosti said. When police tried to stop him, he took off in his vehicle but stopped a short distance away and surrendered, police said.
He was arrested and booked into the Sonoma County Jail on suspicion of pimping and pandering, human trafficking, willful cruelty to a minor causing injury or death, and possession of a loaded firearm because of a weapon found in his car, police and jail personnel said.
He also had an arrest warrant out of Oakland and was being held at the jail Thursday in lieu of $200,000 bail, jail personnel said.
The 17-year-old girl was released to her parents, while the young woman who came with her, Oakland resident Fuey Saechao, was cited for suspected solicitation for prostitution, a misdemeanor, police said.
Five other women also were arrested, including:
Jennifer Marie Stroud, 32, of Santa Rosa; Brittany Nicole Millman, 20, of Richmond and Brittany Eran Mares, 29, of Benicia. All three were cited to appear in court and released, Tosti said.
Two others, Trysha Drum, 22, of Merced and Marina Venza, 20, of Santa Rosa were arrested for suspected prostitution but had warrants that landed them in jail, Tosti said.
(You can reach Staff Writer Mary Callahan at 521-5249 or mary.callahan@pressdemocrat.com.)
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