From Chicago Sun-Times · · 3m
Photo at a buffet, and a deal offered in court
A sex worker told a Chicago jury she was sent to photograph a CBP officer and offer him free sex to leave her group alone.
In brief
A sex worker told a Chicago jury she was sent to photograph a CBP officer and offer him free sex to leave her group alone. The government's case against Luis Uribe now rests partly on a witness who admits she lied, hid meetings with him, and says he never hurt her. Originally reported by Chicago Sun-Times.
A photo finally explained
Days into the federal trial of CBP officer Luis Uribe, jurors heard why someone photographed him at a seafood buffet in Hoffman Estates in 2022.
Sent with a mission
A sex worker testified her boss in China dispatched her to a lunch meeting with Uribe. Her job was to come back with a picture of his face.
The offer she carried
She said she was also carrying a message to trade protection for sex, delivered through an interpreter years later in a Chicago courtroom.
“was asking him not to harm our girls, and we agree to provide free sex to him once per week”
What prosecutors allege
The government says Uribe used his gun and badge to sexually assault four women in Schaumburg and Naperville in 2022, while assigned to O'Hare Airport.
Why the picture mattered
Prosecutors say the buffet photo existed so his face could be passed around the community he was targeting, as a warning.
The charges he faces
Uribe is charged with 10 counts of depriving people of civil rights under color of law, plus brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence.
In custody since December
He has been held in federal custody since his arrest last December. The trial is running at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse downtown.
The defense theory
Attorney Michael Clancy says a prostitution ring run from China set his client up. He concedes Uribe visited prostitutes and calls him a flawed man.
No proof, the lawyer says
Clancy's line is narrow and deliberate: buying sex is not the same as robbery and rape, and he argues the government cannot prove the violent part.
Boss or not a boss
Clancy has called her the on-the-ground Chicago boss of the ring. On the stand, she rejected the label flatly.
“I am never a boss. I worked, myself.”
How they met
She came to the Chicago area around 2018 or 2019. She said she first met Uribe at a Naperville Red Roof Inn, where he paid $300 for sex with her and another woman.
A relationship that continued
He later told her he was immigration police. They swapped numbers and kept in touch, talking through Google Translate because she spoke little English.
Meetings she never reported
She admitted to three or four more encounters with Uribe that she never disclosed to federal authorities. Her explanation was simple.
“They didn't ask me about that.”
The lie about the lunch
She had covered up that a pregnant friend attended the buffet meeting. That friend, she said, actually took the photo of Uribe.
“I only lied once”
Motive, and a denial
She hoped Uribe could help her immigration status and a detained friend. Clancy asked if she turned on him when he couldn't. She denied it, saying she got angry seeing him touch her friend.
He never harmed me
She saw none of the violence other accusers described, and under questioning about the lunch she said the subject of harm never came up. Prosecutors are expected to rest Tuesday, and Uribe may testify.
“He never harmed me.”
The takeaway
The government's case against Luis Uribe now rests partly on a witness who admits she lied, hid meetings with him, and says he never hurt her.
