DENVER — A Broomfield man was sentenced to 20 years in prison on Tuesday for using his construction business as a front for a sex trafficking operation that exploited homeless minors, the FBI's Denver Division said.
Steve Allen Contee was arrested in March 2020 and charged with multiple counts of the following, the FBI said:
- Human trafficking of a minor for sexual servitude
- Human trafficking of a minor for involuntary servitude
- Distribution of a Schedule 1 controlled substance to a minor
- Possession of a weapon by a previous offender
- Human trafficking of an adult for involuntary servitude
Contee pleaded guilty in October 2021 in Adams County District Court and will have to register as a sex offender in addition to his jail sentence, according to the FBI.
> Video above from January: Shedding light on Human Trafficking Prevention Month.
“I saw how he targeted us, he would use drugs to manipulate…he would force us into things that were awful and we all complied because if you don’t do as Steve says, there [are] always violent consequences.” a victim said in a statement that was read in court by an advocate. “My time with Steven I genuinely thought I would die soon because everyone Steven put around me, all of it made us feel unsafe. He always kept me high on drugs because he saw he could take advantage of me when I was high and easily control me. I remember one time when he couldn’t control me he dragged me to a field and held a gun to my head, so it became easier to just do what he said. Ideally, I would like three life sentences for the three lives he messed up. I know this isn’t possible, but he deserves it.”
“Although you are well-spoken and bright, your personality is sociopathic," Judge Robert W. Kiesnowski, Jr. said at one point. "You caught these victims in your web…. You left a path of wreckage for these people. Only thing I can do is make you pay with years of your life and it still won’t fill the holes for these victims. The public needs to know if someone is going to do this, there will be severe consequences.”
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