MEMPHIS, Tenn. A South Memphis man is in jail, held with no bond, accused of pimping out a teenage girl for years. Investigators say Harold Williams was forcing a girl to prostitute and dance at strip clubs since she was 14-years-old.
Kim Benson, who helps women get out of the sex industry, says this story is all too common in Memphis.
“People are thinking ‘It’s just stripping and that`s it’,” said Benson, the executive director of A Bridge of Hope. “There are now pimps in strip clubs.”
Investigators say the victim told police she would bring Williams about $10,000 a month from prostituting and dancing. She told police if she didn’t work, Willaims would beat her.
“You have to understand, fear is horrible. It is crippling,” said Benson. “It’s as if you are getting robbed at gun point, you are going to do what the robber tells you to do.”
Police say they met with the victim after she got in trouble at the DMV trying to get a fake ID. She said she lost hers and Williams needed her to get the ID so she could continue to work at strip clubs.
“That girl right there is telling you all a lot of lies,” said Darrell Williams, the suspect’s brother.
Darrell Williams says his brother didn’t do it.
“It doesn’t make sense. $10,000?” asked Williams. “The stuff she is saying – three years? If she gave him that much money, you tell me where is all that money at? Cause I don’t see it.”
According to the Shelby County tax assessor, Williams owns a $250,000 home in Southern Heights. His brother says Williams only works odd jobs.
According to his record, Williams has been charged before for sex trafficking in Jackson, Mississippi and because of that, a Shelby County judge is holding him with no bond.
“I think Judge Craft did a great job there because if he is going to get out he is going to do it again,” said Benson. “And if he does get out, what is he going to do to the young lady who has told everybody what he has done?”
Darrell insists his brother is no pimp, just a devoted father, “Right now, the kids want their daddy to come home. That`s what they want. They want their father.”
Benson’s non-profit, A Bridge of Hope, helps prostitutes get off the streets. She says about 85 percent of the prostitutes she’s worked at some point also stripped.
Williams is due back in court on Friday, June 6.