Baltimore woman charged with 135 counts of operating sex trafficking ring

BALTIMORE — A Baltimore woman has been indicted on 135 counts of operating a sex trafficking ring.

Prosecutors say Kenika Danielle Leach, 33, took at least 11 different women from Hagerstown to various hotels in Baltimore and Anne Arundel County for the purpose of prostitution.

Police were alerted to the operation in December 2021 when a woman seen at a local hospital told staff she was being trafficked.

This launched a two-year investigation that revealed Leach ran an organization billed as the “Pussy Kat Klub.”

Customers would have paid Leach directly through CashApp, while the women would be compensated in the form of medication.

“By giving the victims drugs, Leach created a dynamic in which the women became indebted to her with a “drug debt,” which they were then forced to repay by engaging in commercial sex acts.” , the Maryland Attorney General's Office said in a statement. .

Prosecutors also accuse Leach of beating the women if they disobeyed him.

“For example, when Leach intended to physically assault women to punish them for disobeying her rules, she would order them to “cling to the wall” and cover their faces so that she could beat them without affect their physical appearance,” the attorney general said. Exit states.

Leach is next due in court on June 24.