Man charged with sex trafficking in Chattanooga agrees to plead guilty

photo Khari Matthew "King Black" Troutman

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A 31-year-old Atlanta man has agreed to plead guilty to charges he trafficked at least one woman to Tennessee for paid sex.

Khari "King Black" Troutman was arrested by local police on Jan. 19 after the woman called 911 from an Applebee's restaurant bathroom on a borrowed cellphone.

Troutman has agreed to plead to one count of transporting a person across state lines for the purposes of prostitution, according to court documents. The charge carries a maximum of 10 years in prison.

The hearing is scheduled for tomorrow at 3 p.m. in U.S. Magistrate Judge Bill Carter's courtroom.

Troutman had been charged also with coercion or enticement of a female. That charge will be dismissed as a part of his agreement to plead guilty and not go to trial.

The woman told police she'd agreed to prostitute herself and have Troutman act as her pimp when she met in a Silver Spring, Md. hotel.

But during the trip she told Troutman she wanted to return home to see her children. That's when he abused her and held her to continue meeting men for sex, which he advertised on the website back page.com

The woman, whose name is not being published under Times Free Press policy regarding victims of sex crimes, had her own account on the site but Troutman took it over as the pair traveled with at least two others through the South.

The 21-year-old woman took clients at 15-, 30-, and 60-minute intervals, charging $80, $100 and $180 for the time periods.

For more see tomorrow's Times Free Press.

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