Iowa Sex Trafficking Victim Who Killed Her Rapist Escapes Rehab, Turns Off Probation Monitor
An 18-year-old sex trafficking victim from Iowa, who was serving a probation term for killing a man who raped her, escaped Friday from a rehabilitation center.
Pieper Lewis walked out of Fresh Start Women's Center in Des Moines around 6:15 a.m. local time and turned off her probation ankle monitor shortly after. Lewis had previously agreed to have her name cited in news reports.
"At this time, her whereabouts are unknown," Jerry Evans, the district's executive director, told CNN.
In September, Lewis was ordered to serve five years of probation for stabbing Zachary Brooks, 37, a father of two, 30 times in June 2020. She pleaded guilty and was charged with voluntary manslaughter and willful injury.
She was also ordered to pay a $150,000 reinstatement fee to the Brooks family which a GoFundMe raised over $560,000 to cover.
Lewis has explained in the past that she was sex trafficked against her will multiple times to Brooks when she was around the age of 15.
Iowa does not have laws that protect sex trafficking victims with minimal criminal immunity.
A warrant is now out for her arrest and officials have asked to have her original sentence of serving up to 20 years in prison imposed. Her prison sentence would have been expunged if she followed through with her probation, a CBS affiliate in Des Moines reported.
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