Woman accused of running sex trafficking operation in Pembroke Pines
A human sex trafficking operation allegedly being run by a woman out of a home in Pembroke Pines was uncovered after a victim said she intentionally overdosed in order to escape, according to a probable cause affidavit.
The investigation began in 2022, and Attorney General Ashley Moody’s office announced Friday that the Office of Statewide Prosecution has charged Elise Mizrachi, the woman accused of running the operation, with two counts of human trafficking. The OSP will be prosecuting the case.
At Memorial Hospital West in late November 2022, a victim told Pembroke Pines Police that she overdosed on fentanyl to escape and that she had thrown her cellphone out of a window while riding in a car a few days earlier in order to preserve evidence of the trafficking that was on it, according to a probable cause affidavit for Mizrachi’s arrest.
An officer searched the area where the woman said she tossed the phone but didn’t find it. The phone was found at a home in Miramar after officers contacted T-Mobile to “ping” its location, according to the affidavit. The owner at the Miramar home told police he picked it up on a walk a few days earlier.
The victim told officers where on the phone to find photo and video evidence. Officers found one photo of a woman whose face was bloodied. The victim told officers that the pictured woman, another victim, had been hit because she refused to engage in sexual acts for money that day, according to the affidavit.
“The photo was shown to her and the other women as an intimidation factor to make them comply,” the affidavit said.
Mizrachi, 41, and the woman who escaped met through a man in Miami identified as “Roy” in the affidavit. The woman was living under a bridge with other women, the affidavit said. “Roy” gave the woman drugs at his home, and she began living there, the affidavit said.
As many as 30 other people sometimes lived there, engaging in commercial sex to pay for the drugs, the affidavit said.
After meeting Mizrachi, the woman moved to her home in the 1500 block of Southwest 97th Terrace. Multiple other women lived at the home, where Mizrachi supplied them with fentanyl and heroin and ran the trafficking operation, the affidavit said.
Mizrachi suggested the woman move to a home in Homestead that the woman heard was more dangerous than either Mizrachi’s or Roy’s. The woman asked Mizrachi if she could have fentanyl before the move, and she purposefully ingested the entire bag, the affidavit said.
“She said that she would rather not be living than be sent to the house,” the affidavit said.
That woman’s escape and report to police led Pembroke Pines Police to obtain a search warrant for the home in Pembroke Pines, which was searched on Nov. 28, 2022. Numerous cellphones were taken from the home, and officers saw evidence of drug use there, according to the affidavit.
Officers found Mizrachi at the home, and she agreed to talk to them. She was found with drugs in her bra that day and was arrested on drug- and weapon-related charges. She denied that any prostitution was happening out of the home, the affidavit said.
Evidence on cellphones taken from the Pembroke Pines home showed text messages and emails discussing “clients” and “dates” at different addresses and hotels, the affidavit said.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel in its four-part investigation Innocence Sold uncovered how hotels have gotten away with thousands of violations of an anti-trafficking law, how state failures contribute to child sex trafficking, and how the state’s foster care system gives sex traffickers access to vulnerable children. The investigative team’s project also highlighted how victims are often treated as criminals.
Officers also found many messages between Mizrachi and co-defendant Courtney Simpson, 58, Mizrachi’s boyfriend who also lived in the home, the affidavit said.
On multiple different dates, Mizrachi texted Simpson about the trafficking operation, according to the affidavit. She texted Simpson in August 2022, “Hey I have a really good ad going on and I just recruited 2 great girls solid ready to work …”
One woman said Simpson “would use the firearms inside the house to intimidate her and the other women into complying,” according to the affidavit.
The Office of Statewide Prosecution charged Simpson with deriving support from the proceeds of prostitution for his role, the affidavit said. He pleaded guilty and has agreed to testify against Mizrachi. He will be on probation until April 2029, Florida Department of Corrections records show.
Mizrachi posted ads with photographs of the women on several commercial sex websites, and photos officers found on cellphones matched the ads. Throughout the investigation, officers identified multiple victims while still others are yet to be identified, according to the affidavit.
One woman flew to South Florida from Pennsylvania in 2022 to stay with Mizrachi. A woman in Pennsylvania who Mizrachi calls her mother was also allegedly involved in trafficking women in that state, according to the affidavit. The woman in Pennsylvania connected the victim with Mizrachi. That victim overdosed on fentanyl multiple times and was forced to have sex for money with multiple “clients” a day, the affidavit said.
Mizrachi would supply the drugs in the morning, afternoon and night, calling it “med time,” according to the affidavit. Victims described to officers Mizrachi withholding drugs from them if they were not having sex for money.
After experiencing withdrawals, “they would eventually comply with Mizrachi’s demands to have sex with her clients to get their fix,” the affidavit said. One victim said Mizrachi would withhold clean needles if she was upset and leave only dirty ones to inject fentanyl with.
“If you guys want to be lazy, you want to slack off? Then you’re not going to get your meds,” Mizrachi said to the women on one occasion when she felt the women did not have enough “dates,” according to the affidavit.
Moody’s office said in its news release Friday that Mizrachi often kept the money the women were paid for herself.
Victims described to officers that they were charged “fees” and had to pay for the drugs they had used, according to the affidavit. One woman said Mizrachi “would come up with fees for various reasons, which would leave some of the women with sometimes as low as $20 per week, or even nothing at all,” according to the affidavit. Two women at one point were charged a $500 fee each for “disrupting the house” after they got into an argument.
As of Friday evening, Mizrachi was held in the Paul Rein Detention Facility. Attorney information was not immediately available.