Charleston entrepreneur and suspected sex trafficker Earl Dawson Caldwell IV was refused bail in a ruling Dec. 20 by magistrate judge Mary Gordon Baker.
The Post and Courier reported that Baker, who sits on the U.S. District Court for South Carolina, based her ruling on her belief that Caldwell was still a menace to the South Carolina community.
Caldwell, a 52-year-old married man with three children, is accused of trafficking a minor for sex, according to the news outlet, which reported that suspected offense happened in Jasper and Beaufort counties between December 2020 and May 2021.
The newspaper reported that Caldwell is alleged to have engaged in sexual acts with a 17-year-old girl on several occasions, along with video recording the acts on three instances.
State and federal authorities were alerted to the crime after the victim had surgery for appendicitis and while under the influence of anesthesia, she reported that she had been pressed to have sex with 10 to 15 men daily, according to the Post and Courier. Law enforcement personnel later took the girl into protective custody.
Last year in the Palmetto State there were 139 cases of human trafficking reported and 179 victims discovered with 96 cases of sex trafficking, 22 cases of labor trafficking, nine cases of sex and labor trafficking collectively, and 12 undetermined trafficking cases, according to the South Carolina Human Trafficking Task Force.
The Justice Department website reported that the federal government gave $101 million last year to help fight human trafficking.
“The scourge of human trafficking is the modern-day equivalent of slavery, brutally depriving victims of basic human rights and essential physical needs as it erodes their sense of dignity and self-worth,” then Attorney General William Barr said in a September 2020 press release. “The Department of Justice is relentless in its fight against the perpetrators of these heinous crimes. Working with state and local law enforcement and community victim service providers, we will continue to bring these criminals to justice and deliver critical aid to survivors.”
