Eight people charged with human trafficking for running prostitution ring in South Jersey, authorities say

Eight people have been charged with human trafficking for running a sprawling prostitution ring in South Jersey that authorities said forced more than a dozen women to work in brothels.

Using lies and threats of physical violence, Vilma Deleon Bracamonte, 55, of Hamilton, and Maria Soledad Xec Chan, 42, of Trenton, ran a trafficking operation that included at least five brothels in Trenton and Camden, New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin said Tuesday.

The traffickers lured women into the brothels by offering them jobs cleaning homes or working at restaurants and instead forced them to engage in sex acts with multiple men and threatened to harm their families, authorities said.

The 15 victims ranged in age from 21 to 58 and were all from South and Central America, said Theresa Hamilton, director of the division of criminal justice at the attorney general’s office.

Santiago Miranda-Gomez, 30, and Francisco Macariosut, 50, both of Trenton, would pick up money from the brothels twice a day, authorities said, and check in on the operation, intimidating victims and the managers of the brothels.

The people who managed the brothels lived in the houses and brought in supplies, collected money from clients, and blocked the women from leaving, said Hamilton.

A witness who used to be part of the operation told authorities one woman who wanted to leave was told she could not because she owed the traffickers $35,000 for bringing her into the United States, said Hamilton.

“We’re talking about human beings,” Platkin said at a Tuesday afternoon news conference. “Women being treated as property.”

The investigation started in May 2024, when investigators were tipped off to a potential prostitution ring and found a business card that identified three locations in Trenton where there was believed to be human trafficking, authorities said. Investigators later found another business card for a plumbing service with an additional location, authorities said.

The business cards, Hamilton said, advertised barber shops and plumbing services, but none of the locations was linked to such businesses. Instead, she said, anyone who called the numbers on the cards was told about the women, their ages, locations, and countries of origin. The prostitution ring charged $50 for 15 minutes of sex, and the women were allowed to keep only $25, authorities said.

Four brothel managers, Abel Aguilera-Ronquillo, 27, Julio C. Delgado-Belmeo, 27, both of Trenton, and Flavio R. Navarrete-Reyes, 45, and Wilmer E. Pinargote-Chimbiligua, 29, both of Camden, were also charged for their involvement in the trafficking ring, authorities said.

All eight people were charged with human trafficking and racketeering. Bracamonte and Chan, as the ring leaders, authorities said, were also charged with organized crime.

“They are daughters, sisters and mothers,” said Hamilton. “They were lured with false promises and exploited through threats, fear, and isolation.”

“That is not freedom,” she added. “It’s modern-day slavery.”