BATON ROUGE — On Thursday, a federal judge convicted a woman from Venezuela on sex trafficking charges following an investigation into a criminal operation run out of Baton Rouge, the United States Department of Justice said.

U.S. Attorney Kurt L. Wall said that 28-year-old Osleidy Vanesa Chourio Diaz pleaded guilty to sex trafficking by force, fraud and coercion in court.

According to her plea, Diaz admitted to recruiting women from outside the United States to work as prostitutes out of an apartment in Baton Rouge between February 2024 to April 2024.

U.S. District Judge John W. deGravelles previously convicted 25-year-old Josmar Jesus Zambrano Chirinos and 25-year-old Allbert Herrera Machado in connection to the crime last April.

Court document say that the trio controlled the victims' day-to-day encounters and told them they would be able to pocket some of the funds they received from sex work but would also owe them a significant debt.

East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff's Office deputies responded to the apartment the ring was being run out of and found the victims and evidence, including multiple stacks of cash, used condoms, sexual devices, cell phones with messages from potential clients and a ledger that tracked the victims' debt.

If convicted, all three defendants could serve a prison sentence, forfeit the proceeds from the offense and be deported from the country.