SAN ANTONIO – A 26-year-old man will spend 25 years in federal prison for his involvement in the sex-trafficking of a child, officials said Wednesday.
After Valentin Renko’s prison term is complete, he will be on supervised release for 20 years, according to a news release from the Department of Justice.
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A judge handed down Renko’s sentence Wednesday morning in San Antonio. Renko pleaded guilty in the case in December 2015.
A co-defendant, Karen Lee, pleaded guilty in the same scheme in April 2015, officials said. The 30-year-old was also sentenced to 20 years in federal prison.
Around the time of July 1 of last year, Renko provided and smoked methamphetamine with Lee and a 12-year-old girl, officials said.
Renko met the child through social media. The girl had been reported missing to the Kirby Police Department in the days leading up to July 1, 2015.
Renko and Lee planned out how they could provide the child to men for commercial sex, investigators said. Lee also took photos of Renko “engaged in sexually explicit conduct” with the girl, the news release said.
Lee told the girl she would have to make money if she wanted to keep living with the pair. Lee encouraged the girl to make dates with men through a social-networking site, and in turn, the child was involved in sexual activity between the dates of July 2 and July 6, officials said.
The child was trafficked, trading sex for money, drugs, or both, investigators said.
The case resulted from a South Texas Officers and Prosecutors Human Trafficking Task Force investigation, led by the FBI, with help from the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Kirby Police Department.