A former Baltimore police officer pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to serving as a pimp for his 19-year-old wife and another young woman who lived with him.
Between February and May of 2013, Lamin Manneh, 32, had been advertising the two women’s sexual services on the Internet set up for them to meet more than 300 customers for sex at hotel rooms and homes.
Manneh, who had just completed the academy and was assigned to the Baltimore’s Eastern District, carried his work gun as he escorted and acted as guard for the women to the places where they were being prostituted, the U.S. attorney’s office reported to the media. Manneh agreed he would rent hotel rooms and an apartment to facilitate “in-calls” or shuttle the two women to locations chosen by their clients.
Manneh was finally nabbed in a sting set up by Maryland State Police after an undercover trooper on a child-sex trafficking task force responded to one of his online ads. Police arranged to meet Manneh’s and his wife at a hotel adjacent the Baltimore-Washington International (BWI) Airport. When the wife met the man inside the hotel room, she reportedly asked $100 for sex.
Even though Manneh’s wife was originally charged with prostitution in Anne Arundel County, records now show show that the charges were dropped mysteriously.
According to a federal indictment, prosecutors said his wife had entered into a “contract of slavery” with Manneh which allowed him to act as her “master.” Manneh was a pimp in the truest sense since he held onto all of his wife’s earnings from her prostitution gig while siphoning off a portion of the other woman’s incoming revenue.
Manneh, of course, was terminated from the Baltimore Police Department. He faces up to five years in prison if convicted on all charges.
