MIDDLETOWN, Pa. — The Lower Swatara Township Police Department announced charges against seven people following an eight-month human trafficking investigation sparked by the alleged sexual exploitation of a 13-year-old Dauphin County girl.
Two suspects from Amsterdam, New York, Neil Moore II and Jeniyah Lockhart-Tippins, pictured below, are accused of taking the victim from a Harrisburg-area Ramada Inn to New York, where the victim allegedly met another man to have sex, according to police.
Three other suspects — Jeremy Maxwell, 19, Mario Maxwell, 21, and Danerick Perry, 26, all of Memphis — are accused of supplying the victim with marijuana and having sex with her in a separate, undated incident at a Carlisle motel after one of the suspects met her at a Harrisburg mall, according to police.
The girl's parents both of Middletown, have been arrested for endangering the welfare of children, a third-degree felony, for failing to report that the victim went missing in December 2021 in a timely manner, according to police.
Police say the girl went missing in December 2021, but her parents did not report her absence to authorities until at least three days after she had gone, according to a criminal complaint affidavit. Her mother later told police it was not the first time that the victim had run away, and that she expected the girl to return.
The girl's mother claimed to have contacted the girl's school regarding her absence. School officials later told police they believed the girl first went missing on Friday, Dec. 11, because she was not at school that day. The mother then reportedly told the school the girl had dentist and doctors appointments on that Friday, but later changed her story and reported the appointments were actually on Thursday, the complaint states.
On Dec. 16, 2021, the mother contacted police again and reported she believed the victim was part of a sex trafficking ring, due to information she had received on social media and from one of the girl's relatives, according to the complaint.
The investigation eventually determined the victim was in Amsterdam, NY, at a home belonging to two of the other charged suspects, Moore and Lockhart-Tippins.
The victim was eventually found by police on Dec. 21, 2021, in the home of Moore and Lockhart-Tippins, the complaint states.
In a later interview with police, the victim's mother indicated she knew the two Amsterdam suspects, the complaint states. Police say she did not initially reveal that information to investigators and deleted a series of text message exchanges with the other suspects, police say.
The victim told police she met Lockhart-Tippins on Instagram, and later agreed to meet with Moore and Lockhart-Tippins at a hotel so Lockhart-Tippins could "do her makeup," the complaint states.
The suspects allegedly met the victim at a Harrisburg-area hotel sometime between Dec. 8 and Dec. 11 and drove her to Amsterdam.
The victim's mother said she knew the girl was speaking to older men on social media and had seen her communicating with them online at various locations around the house in the days before her disappearance. She did not indicate to police that she had any contact with Moore or Lockhart-Tippett, but the victim told police that her mother had been in contact with them while the victim was gone.
As a result of the investigation, Moore is charged with kidnapping of a minor, sexual exploitation of children, unlawful contact with minor, concealing the whereabouts of a child, corruption of minors - sexual offense, corruption of minors.
Lockhart-Tippins is charged with kidnapping of a minor, sexual exploitation of children, unlawful contact with a minor, concealing the whereabouts of a child, corruption of minors - sexual offense, corruption of minors.
The charges against the Memphis suspects are:
- Danerick Perry Jr., 26 (Memphis, TN): luring child into motor vehicle, sexual exploitation of children, possessing child pornography, unlawful contact with a minor, corruption of minors
- Jeremy Maxwell, 19 (Memphis, TN): corruption of minors - defendant age 18 or above and corruption of minors
- Mario Maxwell, 21 (Memphis, TN): corruption of minors
