Man sentenced for human trafficking of teen

A man who coerced a 16-year-old runaway into prostitution and sent her threatening letters from jail instructing her on how much she should earn each day was recently sentenced to more than 12 years in prison for human trafficking.

Dante D. Oliver, 36, is a registered sex offender who investigators believe is a pimp. In the letter Spokane County Sheriff’s Office investigators obtained Oliver instructed the teen girl to post on backpage.com, a known prostitution web site, and told her to put money in his jail account every week.

“This is the part where u plan on bein in pocket & stayin loyal for life,” the letter reads. “Anything less than that is probably a bad move.”

He also made recorded phone calls to the girl while he was in the Spokane County Jail on a no contact order violation charge.

Oliver was found guilty of promoting commercial sexual abuse of a minor, second-degree human trafficking and violation of a no-contact order. He also pleaded guilty to communication with a minor for immoral purposes in a separate case.

In addition to serving 147 months in prison, Oliver was ordered to pay a special $3,333 fee for human trafficking and promoting prostitution.

His criminal history includes convictions for failure to register as a sex offender and domestic violence assault. He was convicted of statutory sexual seduction in Clark County, Nevada, in 2004. The charge is similar to statutory rape.