Council Bluffs Man sentenced for Sex Trafficking Teenagers

Acting United States Attorney Steven A. Russell announced that Jesse Cody, 34 of Council Bluffs, Iowa was sentenced on July 26, 2022, for sex trafficking two teenagers between Iowa and Nebraska.  Chief United States District Judge Robert F. Rossiter, Jr sentenced Cody to 16 years’ imprisonment. There is no parole in the federal system. After his release from prison, Cody will have to register as a sex offender and serve a five-year term of supervised release. 

A federal jury previously convicted Cody of trafficking an eighteen year old victim in foster care and a nineteen year old woman who resided in Omaha.  The foster care victim testified at trial that Cody forced her to have sex with men for money for Cody’s financial gain.  The victim testified that Cody beat, raped, and choked her when she would refuse to comply with his demands.  Cody induced the second victim, then a college student, into sex trafficking by misrepresenting to the victim the money that she could make and the lifestyle that she would lead and then Cody took most of the money for himself. 

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS), Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Omaha Police Department.