After pleading no contest as part of a deal, a man accused of more than a dozen counts of possessing child pornography was sentenced to 15 years in a Florida prison.
Manuel Ardon-Rodriguez, who voluntarily told law enforcement that he had entered the United States illegally, was charged with 15 counts of possession of child pornography in July 2023 after Florida Department of Law Enforcement and Homeland Security Investigations agents raided a home on Cervantes Street had raided, believed to be part of a sex trafficking ring.
Circuit Judge Coleman Robinson imposed the sentence Thursday afternoon after Rodriguez pleaded no contest to 10 counts. In return, the Public Prosecution Service dropped the remaining five charges.
Pensacola Sex Trafficking Case: An Alabama mother allegedly trafficked her teenage daughter to men in Pensacola
A companion case to Rodriguez involves multiple individuals believed to have participated in a sex trafficking operation involving a 14-year-old girl from Foley, Alabama.
Records show the Alabama girl was allegedly held against her will in Pensacola while Kilman Flores-Ardon, Edwin Martinez-Cruz and Manuel Ardon-Martinez took turns raping her over a three-day period in January 2023.
Charging documents for the three men allege that they “knowingly engaged in human trafficking, or attempted to engage in human trafficking, or financially benefited by receiving something of value from their participation…thereby exposing a person to human trafficking . .”
The state alleges the teen’s mother failed to report the abuse and may have received payments for the men to rape her daughter.
According to court records, it appears police discovered the child pornography on Ardon-Rodriguez’s phone during a raid to find the alleged sex traffickers. Ardon-Rodriguez has never been charged with human trafficking.
Homeland Security personnel noted in their reports that everyone involved in the case “appears to be undocumented aliens (UDAs).”
All cases of human trafficking remain stuck in the legal system and are still ongoing. All have pleaded not guilty.
This article originally appeared in Pensacola News Journal: Pensacola trafficking linked to man convicted of child pornography
