Five Beaufort, Jasper Co. residents charged as part of Hardeeville human trafficking sting
Four men and a minor from Beaufort and Jasper counties were charged by Hardeeville police as part of a statewide human trafficking sting announced Monday.
The Hardeeville Police Department charged the Lowcountry residents on counts of soliciting sex in addition to various drug and weapons offenses, according to an S.C. Law Enforcement Division press release.
Human trafficking and prostitution are persistent problems in the city of Hardeeville, which sits on I-95 between Savannah and Charleston. Several motels in Hardeeville are often sites of alleged sex trafficking.
Reached by phone Tuesday, Hardeeville Police Chief Sam Woodward said officers posed undercover as sex workers and made the arrests when the men allegedly arrived at the agreed-upon meeting location.
“We didn’t intentionally go after these people; they came to us,” Woodward said. “You’re never going to stop it. What we’re trying to do is keep up with it.”
He declined to say where exactly the arrests took place, citing it as an ongoing investigation. He did say that the arrests took place near the motel area in Hardeeville off of U.S. 17. The operation didn’t target sex traffickers but was intended to deter people from seeking out commercial sex, an official told a Charleston newspaper.
It involved other agencies like SLED, the S.C. Attorney General’s Office, the Jasper County Sheriff’s Office, the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office, and additional Lowcountry law enforcement. One man was charged by the Florence County Sheriff’s Office and seven were charged by the Summerville Police Department.
The arrests of Beaufort and Jasper County residents included:
▪ Michael Jamison, 41, of Bluffton, charged with solicitation of prostitution and drug and weapons charges.
▪ Christopher Hamilton, 47, of Jasper County, charged with solicitation of prostitution and drug and weapons charges.
Jelfriess Sevilla, 38, of Bluffton, charged with solicitation of prostitution.
▪ Kenneth Zentner, 59, of Beaufort, charged with solicitation of prostitution and a weapons charge.
▪ A 17-year-old Bluffton minor was also charged with solicitation of prostitution.
As of Tuesday, all four men were released from the Jasper County Detention Center. No information was available on the minor.
On Monday, Hamilton received three surety bonds, requiring payment to be released from jail, totaling to $30,000. On Apr. 19, Zentner and Sevilla both received one surety bond each for $465. Court records were not available for Jamison and the Bluffton minor.
Solicitation of prostitution is a misdemeanor on first and second offenses. It becomes a felony on a third or further offense.
The Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette newspapers don’t typically name those charged with misdemeanors, unless there is a sufficient public interest in their disclosure.
When officers from the Hardeeville Police Department make arrests related to sex workers, Woodward said, they are “making sure that they’re not involved in human trafficking, even though most prostitutes are.”
“We will try to do a deep investigation and see if we can get them [trafficked individuals] out,” Woodward said. “If we go after the guys trying to get the prostitutes, and they’re worried about getting caught, maybe, and just maybe, we can stop it.”
How to spot the signs
There are a number of reasons why individuals who have been trafficked might not seek out help. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has identified several factors that might help you spot potential dangers so that you can call for help.
- Avoiding eye contact and or social interaction
- The person has no personal items of their own including identification
- They have come readily prepared with rehearsed responses as though they have been coached
- They appear to be malnourished
- They have bruises, scrapes and other injuries that may have come from being abused
If you or someone you know has been a victim of human trafficking, support can be found by calling the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888 or Hopeful Horizons at 843-770-1070.
This story was originally published April 26, 2022 at 1:24 PM.
