Man charged with rape after allegedly having sex with trafficked 14-year-old

An Albuquerque man is accused of the statutory rape of a teenage girl who police say was brought to the city from California to be sex trafficked.

William Cates, 50, is charged with criminal sexual penetration and patronizing prostitution in the case. He has been booked into the Metropolitan Detention Center.

It is unclear if he has an attorney assigned to his case.

Albuquerque police say the 14-year-old told them she had sex with Cates, one of more than a dozen “Johns,” after officers arrested alleged sex traffickers Roderick Norseweather, 25, and Tajahnae Johnson, 21 — the pair accused of bringing two teens to the city for sex work.

The human trafficking charges filed against Norseweather and Johnson have since been dismissed in state court, according to records, because the case has been transferred to federal authorities.

Online court records show federal charges have been filed against Johnson, who told an FBI agent that Norseweather had a goal for them to make $5,000 doing sex work and, when they only made $3,000, he traveled to Albuquerque from California “to fix the way the girls were working.”

At least $200 of the money the teens made, according to Albuquerque police, came from Cates.

The teen told detectives she was waiting for a bus to take her to do sex work along Central when a man — later identified as Cates — offered her a ride, according to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court. She told police the man “was looking for a little bit more,” so she invited him to her hotel room and gave him prices for sex acts.

Police said the teen told them she spoke with Cates “about his tattoo and how he resembled her father” as he drove them to the Econo Lodge East motel on Central, near Tramway. The two had sex at the motel and Cates paid her $200.

Police identified Cates as the man through surveillance video of the pair arriving at the motel in a truck that was registered to him, the complaint states. The teen was given a sexual assault exam and a warrant was written for Cates’ DNA to be tested against evidence from the rape kit.

Prosecutors filed a motion to keep Cates behind bars until trial, saying “he engaged in a sexual episode with a 14-year-old female child.”

“The defendant is 50 years old. He has the (life) experience to know that committing the act was wrongful,” according to the motion.