JACKSON, Miss. — A man arrested after a woman walked into a Mississippi police station saying she had been abducted in Florida has pleaded not guilty to violating federal law governing transporting persons for prostitution.
Ruperto Moncillo Flores and Jacobo Feliciano-Francisco, also known as Uriel Castillo-Ochoa, were arrested June 27 after the woman told Hattiesburg police she’d been abducted in Panama City Beach.
The woman was a witness in a human trafficking case.
Flores, of Lawrenceville, Ga., was indicted for violating the Mann Act. The charge is related to another woman who was found during the investigation. He isn’t charged with the Florida abduction.
He pleaded not guilty Monday in U.S. District Court in Hattiesburg.
Feliciano-Francisco pleaded has not guilty in Florida to kidnapping the victim.
Authorities are seeking a second suspect in the kidnapping.
An FBI affidavit dated July 1 described Flores as a transporter of women for a prostitution network.
The indictment said Feliciano-Francisco and an unidentified man abducted the victim as retaliation for cooperating in an earlier human trafficking investigation, which led to numerous convictions in Tennessee and Kentucky. The indictment also said Feliciano-Francisco sexually assaulted the woman and planned to force her to work as a prostitute in Louisiana. The court documents did not say which city in Louisiana.
The affidavit filed in Flores’ case in Mississippi said Feliciano-Francisco called Flores on June 27, the same day the victim was abducted, and asked him to take a woman from Hattiesburg to Louisiana for the purpose of prostitution.
A different woman questioned as part of the investigation told police that Flores had taken her from Georgia to Mississippi for prostitution, with the final destination also being a city in Louisiana. That was the alleged crime for which he was indicted on the Mann Act charge.
Flores pleaded not guilty Monday in U.S. District Court in Hattiesburg. Trial was set for Oct. 21.
His lawyer, Wesley Broadhead, said Tuesday that he only recently got involved in the case and that it’s too early for him to comment.
Feliciano-Francisco, of Hattiesburg, is charged in U.S. District Court in Panama City with kidnapping the alleged victim from her house in Panama City Beach. He pleaded not guilty on Aug. 12 and is scheduled for trial Dec. 9. He’s facing a total of five charges, including kidnapping and retaliating against a witness.
His attorney, Maria Dykes, was in court Tuesday morning and did not immediately respond to a phone message.
An affidavit filed in federal court in Panama City says the woman was outside her house when two men drove up and one of them forced her into the vehicle about 11:45 a.m., and then drove her to Mississippi.
The affidavit identifies Feliciano-Francisco as the driver, but said the other suspect was unidentified. The FBI said in a news release last week that it’s looking for the second suspect and released a sketch of him.
Authorities say the woman escaped through a bathroom window from the house in Hattiesburg and went to the police department about 6:30 p.m.
Feliciano-Francisco was arrested at the house that night. Flores was arrested on Interstate 59 in Jones County, Miss.