Men allegedly pimped Mexican girls in NYC

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NEW YORK, Dec. 11 (UPI) -- Three brothers have been extradited from Mexico to face charges of bringing teenagers to New York to work as prostitutes, federal prosecutors say.

Benito Lopez-Perez, 32, Jose Gabino Barrientos-Perez, 51, and Anastasio Romero-Perez, 39, allegedly lured girls as young as 14 by promising them steady relationships, the New York Post reported. A fourth man, Antonio Lira-Robles, 37, has also been extradited and charged with running a similar operation with his cousins, Loretta Lynch, the U.S. attorney in New York's Brooklyn borough, said.

Lynch said Monday investigators also reunited a woman who was a victim of sex-trafficking with her daughter, a decade after the girl's father, a pimp, forced them apart.

"Few crimes are more repugnant than the trafficking of innocent women and girls for sex," Lynch said. "The defendants lured young women into the world's oldest profession using the world's oldest ruse -- the promise of a committed relationship and a better life."

Lynch said federal investigators worked with Mexican federal police on the case. She alleged the Perez brothers first recruited girls to work as prostitutes in Mexico and then, in 2005, began smuggling them to New York.