Thomas M. Williamson, 32, and Michelle N. Feldman, 29, were indicted last week on one count each of human trafficking, two counts of extortion, three counts of sexual battery, two counts of grand theft, one count of felonious assault and one count of theft. All are felony charges.
Both entered not guilty pleas during arraignment in Franklin County Common Pleas Court Monday, April 20. They waived bond, so they remain in the Franklin County jail.
If convicted on all counts, Feldman and Williamson could be sentenced to more than 40 years in prison, Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O'Brien said.
And more charges could be coming. O'Brien said investigators with Reynoldsburg police and the Central Ohio Human Trafficking Task Force have found evidence of a possible fourth victim.
All the women apparently responded to a fake profile that Williamson is accused of posting on the dating website meetme.com.
Reynoldsburg police Lt. Ron Wright said Williamson created a profile of a military man who was living out of the country and was looking for romance.
After the women developed an online relationship with the nonexistent suitor, they were told to go visit his "best friend," who turned out to be Williamson.
"That's when things went downhill," Wright said.
Each of the women moved in with Williamson and Feldman in their rented townhome at 1244 White Birch Court with the understanding that the military man would meet them there when he returned to the United States. Instead, Wright said, they were manipulated and blackmailed by the couple.
O'Brien described what happened as "a brainwashing kind of thing."
He said all the women were adults, but he didn't give their ages or say where they lived.
Williamson was arrested on March 27, the day that Reynoldsburg police served a search warrant at the home after a series of interviews with a woman who moved out March 4 and asked for police help in getting her belongings.
An affidavit filed by police to obtain the search warrant included information gathered during the interviews. The woman reported that Williamson and Feldman treated her "like a slave," requiring her to do housework and ask permission to leave the house. She said the couple threatened to post nude pictures and videos of her online if she left.
She told police she "voluntarily made a pornographic movie" with another woman staying at the house, "which Williamson and Feldman filmed on a video camera and a cellphone."
The woman also provided the couple with access to her financial information because, she said, the Marine she had met online "wanted to take care of her and be in charge of everything."
She estimated the couple took $1,800 of her Supplemental Security Income payments and an equal amount of her earnings from work, plus her $298 income-tax refund.
She said the woman with whom she made the video remained at the house and had been beaten "numerous times" by Williamson.
According to the indictment, the sexual-battery counts involve instances in which the women were "coerced to submit" to sex acts.
The human-trafficking count involves just one of the women. Wright said her experiences, from about Oct. 1, 2013, to March 27 of this year, fit the legal definition, which includes "involuntary servitude."
The three women are not named in the indictment, which identifies them by their initials.
Wright said the investigation determined that one of the women was caught shoplifting a candy bar from a nearby Kroger in December. She told police she was "hungry and was not allowed to eat" where she lived, Wright said, but she refused to cooperate further.
When police searched the home, they found videos of sex acts involving the women and documents containing evidence of the extortion and thefts, he said.
On April 7, 11 days after Williamson was arrested, further investigation led to Feldman's arrest.
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