Jury awards $164 million to woman trafficked for sex as a child at Georgia Super 8 hotel
A federal jury has awarded $164 million to a woman who was trafficked for sex as a teenager at a Super 8 hotel in Georgia, finding the hotel operator knew or should have known about the trafficking and financially benefited from rooms used by her traffickers.
The verdict against Lincoln Bancorp LLC includes $44 million in compensatory damages and $120 million in punitive damages. Attorneys for the woman, identified in court documents as J.R. to protect her privacy, described the award as the largest sex trafficking verdict in U.S. history.
J.R. was 15 when the trafficking began in 2020. Evidence presented during the three-day trial showed that traffickers repeatedly brought her to the hotel throughout 2020 and 2021, with some stays lasting weeks or months.
J.R. testified that she was sold for sex between seven and 15 times a day and that she endured hundreds of assaults while she was 15 and 16 years old.
At one point, she said she asked a front desk employee for directions to a train station because she was trying to escape her traffickers. She testified that the employee refused to help her or allow her to use the hotel phone because he knew she was associated with the traffickers.
Former hotel housekeepers provided additional testimony about what they said they witnessed at the property. One former employee described prostitution as occurring around the clock and said young girls were regularly present. She testified that hotel employees rented rooms by the hour or half-hour for sex.
The former housekeeper further testified that some traffickers paid front-office employees to serve as lookouts and that she witnessed employees alert traffickers when police arrived.
Two housekeepers testified that the activity they observed was a regular occurrence. The hotel had produced a trafficking training document that it said employees had received, but both workers testified that they had never seen or heard of the document.
J.R., now 22, has two children and is working toward a college degree. She has expressed interest in helping other trafficking survivors prepare to testify.
The lawsuit was filed under a federal law that allows trafficking survivors to seek damages from businesses that knowingly benefit financially from participating in a venture they knew or should have known involved trafficking.
Attorneys representing J.R. said they hope the substantial punitive damages will encourage hotels to respond when employees encounter signs of trafficking rather than ignore them.
The legal team said it is handling roughly 20 to 30 other trafficking cases at various stages, including some that have not yet been filed.
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