San Jose Escorts: Alamo trips were business, attorney says
Alamo, the 74-year-old leader of a multistate ministry with headquarters in Fouke, is charged in U.S. District Court in Texarkana with five counts of transporting underage girls across state lines for sex in violation of the federal Mann Act. The prosecution and defense gave their opening statements Tuesday afternoon after spending the morning selecting the 12 jurors who will decide Alamo’s fate.
In his opening statement, assistant U.S. attorney Clay Fowlkes told jurors that the victims, who he indicated now range in age from 17 to about 30, will testify that Alamo took them as wives at ages as young as 8 and repeatedly sexually assaulted them.
“Each one of these girls lived a life that was completely controlled by the defendant,” Fowlkes said. “Each one of them lived a life that was completely ruined by the defendant’s criminal conduct.”
A federal offense because of the interstate element, the Mann Act makes it a crime to take a girl under age 18 across state lines “with intent that the individual engage in prostitution, or in any sexual activity for which any person can be charged with a criminal offense.”