His attorney, Adam Goodman, said, “He wasn’t the one who committed the violence.” Vass said he was victimized himself and forced to marry one of his tormenters before becoming a boss in the trafficking ring, the Herald reported. Vass’s alleged co-conspirators, Gabor Acs, 32, and Viktor Berki, 30, a former policeman in Hungary, are awaiting trial.Ĭircuit Judge Richard Hersch sentenced Vass to just over 140 months in state prison-a lesser sentence apparently due in part to his own alleged victimhood. “I was under their control, all day, all night,” the man said. I lost all my friends.”Īnother victim read a statement in court revealing how he was treated like a “machine.” “I started drinking heavily to try and forget. “It’s really hard for me to socialize, to mingle with people,” one victim testified through a Hungarian interpreter, according to the Herald.
Nearly two years in captivity left the victims with deep emotional wounds. He was forced into prostitution and made to perform sex acts on live web cameras for little to no pay-only extra food or cigarettes, the Herald reported. The suspects allegedly raped him and kept him locked in bedrooms in two cities.
