Sex-trafficking trial involving high-ranking Asheville police officer begins in Virginia
By Kimberly King
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ASHEVILLE, North Carolina (WLOS) — A federal jury in Fairfax County, Virginia, began hearing testimony Tuesday in a sex trafficking case involving Asheville Police Deputy Chief Jim Baumstark, who is accused of trying to protect police officers who worked for him during his time at the Fairfax County Police Department.
Baumstark, who is second in command at APD behind Chief David Zack, is part of a lawsuit filed by a victim of sex trafficking, who alleges the Virginia officers enable her trafficking by allowing the ring to operate.
Prominent civil rights attorney Victor Glasberg represents a woman from Costa Rica identified in the lawsuit as Jane Doe. The lawsuit alleges the Costa Rican woman was recruited from her native country by Hazel Sanchez Cerdas, whom she said told her she would serve as an escort to wealthy men if she came to the United States.
Instead, Jane Doe said Cerdas forced her to become a prostitute.
Cerdas was convicted in a separate trial and sentenced to two years in prison.
The Jane Doe federal case laid out allegations that a former cop turned whistleblower told Baumstark, who was a captain in the Fairfax County Police Department at the time, that officers were having sex with the women they were supposed to be protecting.
The legal brief laid out details of several conversations the whistleblower allegedly had with Baumstark, who was his supervisor. The whistleblower, former Fairfax County Police Department detective William Woolf, said he went to Baumstark about his work investigating the sex ring, as well as information he said a female victim shared with him.
According to the lawsuit, Woolf said, “In his conversations with Capt. Baumstark, trafficking victims, who trusted him, had reported to him that Fairfax County Police Officers were extorting sex from the trafficking enterprises they were also protecting.”
He stated, “Capt. Baumstark expressed no interest in what Det. Woolf had reported. Rather, he directed Det. Woolf to forget it and ignore what he had been told.”
Baumstark joined the Asheville Police Department in 2015, having been recruited by former Chief Tammy Hooper, who came from the nearby Alexandria (Virginia) Police Department.
According to an APD spokeswoman, Zack said he could not comment on the pending case.
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