Orange County District Attorney Press Release
For Immediate Release, Case # 13NF1430: October 3, 2013
FULLERTON – A woman identified in an undercover Facebook operation was sentenced yesterday to six years in state prison for attempting to recruit an undercover officer posing as a 17-year-old girl on Facebook to engage in commercial sex. Dominica Darlene Wallace, 25, Vallejo, pleaded guilty yesterday, Oct. 2, 2013, to one felony count of pandering by procuring for the purpose of prostitution.
Circumstances of the Case
Wallace is a pimp who sexually exploits women and/or children for financial gain.
Prior to April 30, 2013, Wallace befriended and engaged in conversation, via Facebook and texts, with an Anaheim Police Department (APD) undercover officer (Officer) posing as a 17-year-old girl. Wallace believed Officer was a 17-year-old minor, instructed her on the proper methods of prostitution, and expressed a desire to take her to Las Vegas in order to have her engage in commercial sex. After the online conversations, Wallace downloaded a fake picture from Officer’s Facebook page, believing that it was a photo of the girl with whom she had been speaking. She posted it as an ad on a website known for the solicitation of prostitutes. It is the policy of the Orange County District Attorney’s Office not to divulge the name of such websites.
On or about April 30, 2013, Wallace personally answered two separate calls, made by two APD undercover officers, who responded to the ad that Wallace had set up. Wallace set up sexual encounters for the underage girl and directed the two APD undercover officers to an Anaheim motel where she believed her newly recruited, 17-year-old prostitute was staying.
Later that day, Wallace was contacted by APD and subsequently arrested.
This case was investigated by APD and Deputy District Attorney Brad Schoenleben of the HEAT Unit prosecuted this case.
Proposition 35 and HEAT
In November 2012, California’s anti-human trafficking Proposition 35 (Prop 35) was enacted in California with 81 percent of the vote, and over 82 percent of the vote in Orange County, to increase the penalty for human trafficking, particularly in cases involving the trafficking of a minor by force.
The Orange County District Attorney’s Human Exploitation And Trafficking (HEAT) Unit targets perpetrators who sexually exploit and traffic women and underage girls for financial gain, including pimps, panderers, and human traffickers. The HEAT Unit uses a tactical plan called PERP: Prosecution, to bring justice for victims of human trafficking and hold perpetrators responsible using Prop 35; Education, to provide law enforcement training to properly handle human trafficking and pandering cases; Resources from public-private partnerships to raise public awareness about human trafficking and provide assistance to the victims; and Publicity, to inform the public and send a message to human traffickers that this crime cannot be perpetrated without suffering severe consequences.
Under the law, human trafficking is described as depriving or violating the personal liberty of another person with the intent to effect a violation of pimping or pandering. Pimping is described as knowingly deriving financial support in whole or in part from the proceeds of prostitution. Pandering is the act of persuading or procuring an individual to become a prostitute, or procuring and/or arranging for a person work in a house of prostitution.
Penal Code Section 236.1 defines:
(1) “Coercion” includes any scheme, plan, or pattern intended to cause a person to believe that failure to perform an act would result in serious harm to or physical restraint against any person; the abuse or threatened abuse of the legal process; debt bondage; or providing and facilitating the possession of any controlled substance to a person with the intent to impair the person’s judgment.
(2) “Commercial sex act” means sexual conduct on account of which anything of value is given or received by any person.
(3) “Deprivation or violation of the personal liberty of another” includes substantial and sustained restriction of another’s liberty accomplished through force, fear, fraud, deceit, coercion, violence, duress, menace, or threat of unlawful injury to the victim or to another person, under circumstances where the person receiving or apprehending the threat reasonably believes that it is likely that the person making the threat would carry it out.
(4) “Duress” includes a direct or implied threat of force, violence, danger, hardship, or retribution sufficient to cause a reasonable person to acquiesce in or perform an act which he or she would otherwise not have submitted to or performed; a direct or implied threat to destroy, conceal, remove, confiscate, or possess any actual or purported passport or immigration document of the victim; or knowingly destroying, concealing, removing, confiscating, or possessing any actual or purported passport or immigration document of the victim.
(5) “Forced labor or services” means labor or services that are performed or provided by a person and are obtained or maintained through force, fraud, duress, or coercion, or equivalent conduct that would reasonably overbear the will of the person.
(6) “Great bodily injury” means a significant or substantial physical injury.
(7) “Minor” means a person less than 18 years of age.
(8) “Serious harm” includes any harm, whether physical or nonphysical, including psychological, financial, or reputational harm, that is sufficiently serious, under all the surrounding circumstances, to compel a reasonable person of the same background and in the same circumstances to perform or to continue performing labor, services, or commercial sexual acts in order to avoid incurring that harm.
(i) The total circumstances, including the age of the victim, the relationship between the victim and the trafficker or agents of the trafficker, and any handicap or disability of the victim, shall be factors to consider in determining the presence of “deprivation or violation of the personal liberty of another,” “duress,” and “coercion” as described in this section.
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Tony Rackauckas, District Attorney 401 Civic Center Drive West Santa Ana, CA 92701 Contacts:
Susan Kang Schroeder Chief of Staff Office: 714-347-8408 Cell: 714-292-2718 Farrah Emami Spokesperson Office: 714-347-8405 Cell: 714-323-4486