ST. GEORGE – A Las Vegas man, arrested last year during a vice sting, pleaded guilty to human trafficking and other charges Monday.

Leroy Haley III, 31, of Las Vegas, appeared in Fifth District Court in St. George Monday for what would have been a jury trial. However, he accepted a plea deal and pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree felony aggravated human tracking, two counts of third-degree felony exploitation of a prostitute, one count of third-degree felony assault by a prisoner, and one count of third-degree felony drug possession with intent to distribute.

Haley was arrested Aug. 24, 2013, as a part of a vice sting conducted by the St. George Police Department, Washington County Sheriff’s Office and Homeland Security Investigations. The sting also saw the arrest of Francis Mary Uhrhan, 20, of Las Vegas. A 17-year-old juvenile was also caught up in the sting and was soon after identified as a victim.

According to arresting documents, Haley was described as being Uhrhan’s and the 17-year-old female’s “pimp.” He also drove them from Las Vegas to St. George and Salt Lake City to engage in acts of prostitution. Both women also told police Haley had been physically abusive toward them.

Uhrhan had been driving a car registered to Haley to the hotel where the sting operation took place. Investigators found the hotel in St. George where Haley and the others had been staying and proceeded to arrest him. He was taken to Dixie Regional Medical Center after complaining about a medical condition and ended up in an altercation with medical staff and police officers. A search of the hotel room where the group was staying turned up a distributable amount of drugs connected to Haley.

Both Haley and Uhrhan originally pleaded not guilty to criminal charges on Oct. 23, 2013. However, Uhrhan later pleaded guilty to her role in the crime. Judge James Shumate sentenced her to five-years-to-life at the state prison for first-degree aggravated exploitation of a prostitute – related to the juvenile – but stayed execution of the sentence. Instead, Uhrhan was sentenced to one year in jail and 36 months supervised probation.

At the time, Shumate referred to Uhrhan as just as much a victim of the crime as the juvenile had been.

Following the vice sting, the juvenile victim was taken to the Washington County Youth Crisis Center and released to her parents’ custody.

Haley is scheduled to be sentenced July 30, at 9:30 a.m.

Related posts

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• Two accused of human trafficking, exploiting prostitute plead not guilty to charges
• Charges added in human trafficking sting; juvenile victim
• Prostitution sting: four adults, one juvenile arrested

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