A San Diego man who pleaded guilty to a federal sex trafficking charge for recruiting and soliciting teenage girls and women to engage in prostitution was sentenced Monday to more than eight years in prison.
Jonathan Madison pleaded guilty last year to advertising commercial sex acts with the victims and transporting women and girls to customers in California and Colorado between 2017 and 2020, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Locally, Madison was investigated for his involvement with a teenage girl in San Diego County between November 2017 and September 2018, the U.S. Attorney's Office reported.
According to court documents, Madison posted online advertisements featuring the girl, who was 15 and 16 years old at the time, and helped arrange for her to meet with "johns'' in San Diego County and other southern California locations. Prosecutors allege Madison was aware the girl was under the age of 18.
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Court documents state that a review of Madison's email account showed he posted ads featuring the girl on sites like backpage.com and craigslist.com.
His cell phone was also tracked near the sites of several locations around the dates and times where the girl was engaging in sex acts with customers, according to an FBI agent's affidavit.
Madison's plea also included admissions to filming himself having sex with an underage girl and sending the video to her cell phone.
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Madison was arrested in April of 2020. He was sentenced Monday to 100 months in prison and will also be placed on supervised release for five years.
