Man accused of trafficking teens for sex in North Texas arrested by feds
.jpg "A fight early Sunday at a Fort Worth hotel bar involved a suspected Mongol member, but no arrests were reported.")
A Texas man known as “Iceberg” was arrested for allegedly engaging in child sex trafficking, according to a criminal complaint filed in federal court in late August.
The document says that Phillip Cortez sold several girls ages 16 and 17 for the purposes of sex. Cortez is accused of trafficking in Dallas, Fort Worth, Austin, Galveston, Houston and Oklahoma City. It doesn’t say where Cortez lived. The case was filed in Dallas.
One of the women, who was 17 when she knew Cortez, said that he provided her with hotel rooms, condoms and lubricants and kept the profits.
Cortez is accused of advertising the girls online on websites known to be used by traffickers and pimps, according to the complaint.
Investigators found several ads online allegedly placed by Cortez for one of the women. They also recovered hotel receipts and T-Mobile records from Dallas and Fort Worth that correspond with the dates and locations documented on the ads, the complaint says.
An arrest warrant for Cortez was issued on Sept. 10.
The next day, a multijurisdictional operation led to the arrest of Tremont Blakemore, 39, who Dallas police said ran a sex-trafficking ring in Fort Worth, Dallas and Lancaster. He has not been charged federally.
Fifteen women were recovered from two different homes during the Sept. 11 sting. Two boys — ages 2 years and 9 months — were also removed from a home and placed into foster care.
The women were all provided opportunities for counseling and other services targeted at helping victims of human trafficking, police said.
Blakemore is accused of routinely keeping a group of about 20 women whom he sold for profit, police said. However, Dallas police suspect he has controlled and manipulated more than a hundred women.
This story was originally published September 26, 2018 at 3:44 PM.