You Are Not Alone in What Happened in That Hotel Room
You are reading this page because something happened to you in a hotel in Concord, or somewhere nearby, and the door still does not feel fully closed. Maybe the trafficker has been arrested. Maybe no one has been charged yet. Maybe you are still running the math on whether you are allowed to be angry, whether what happened to you has a legal name, and whether anyone in this country is going to do anything about it. We want to answer those three questions straight, before we get into any law.
What happened to you has a legal name. It is called sex trafficking, and it is a federal crime. The hotel where it happened is not innocent bystander real estate in this country. Under a federal statute called the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, a hotel that took money from a venture it knew or should have known was trafficking can be sued. In November 2025, a senior federal judge in San Francisco — U.S. District Judge Maxine Chesney — ruled that the company behind the Motel 6 and Studio 6 brands, G6 Hospitality, must face exactly that kind of claim by a woman identified in court papers as B.J., who alleges she was trafficked for commercial sex at a Studio 6 in Concord between 2012 and 2016, and that the on-site manager of that very hotel personally participated in selling her.
That ruling matters to you even if your case is not B.J.’s case, because Judge Chesney’s decision is the same one that opens the courtroom door for trafficking survivors across California. The legal standard she applied is the same standard a jury will weigh when it hears your story. What follows is the full picture of what that law says, who it reaches, what evidence proves it, what your case is worth, and what we do the moment you call.
You have rights. You have time. You have a case.
What the Court Just Decided — and Why It Matters to You
The ruling you may have read about is real, and it is recent. In B.J. v. G6 Hospitality, LLC, No. 3:22-cv-07028 (N.D. Cal.), Judge Chesney denied the motions to dismiss that G6 Hospitality, Hilton, Choice, and Marriott had filed to throw the case out of federal court. The court ruled that B.J. failed to plausibly allege that Choice, Hilton, or Marriott were complicit in the trafficking, so those three brands walked at this stage. But the court ruled that B.J.’s claims against G6 Hospitality specifically must proceed, because the complaint alleged that the manager of the Studio 6 in Concord personally participated in the trafficking. The judge quoted B.J.’s complaint directly:
“Plaintiff alleges her trafficker ‘worked directly with the manager of the Studio 6 Concord to sell [plaintiff] for commercial sex,’ and that ‘when the trafficker was not available, Studio 6’s manager stepped in and trafficked [plaintiff] to buyers’ at the hotel.”
That is not a passing detail. That allegation is the reason G6 Hospitality, the parent company, is the one named defendant the court kept in the case. The court accepted that a corporate manager — the person running the property on behalf of the brand — can pull the corporate parent into a sex-trafficking case under federal civil law. We will explain exactly how that works in a moment, because the same theory can apply to your case against whatever hotel was used.
What is happening right now, as of this page, is that G6 has been told by a federal judge: you cannot make this go away by filing a motion. You have to answer for what your manager did. The case is moving forward into discovery, into depositions, and toward a jury. For the rest of the hotel industry, the message from the Northern District of California is even louder — Doe #1 v. Red Roof Inns, Inc., 21 F.4th 714 (11th Cir. 2021), the only appellate case to dismiss franchisor hotel defendants under this statute, did not shut the courthouse door; it set the standard for what a complaint has to allege to keep the door open, and Judge Chesney just held that B.J.’s allegations meet that standard.
The Federal Law That Makes the Hotel a Defendant — 18 U.S.C. § 1595
The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 created, at 18 U.S.C. § 1595(a), a private civil right of action that lets a trafficking survivor sue not only the trafficker but also any business that benefited financially from the venture. The statute reads:
“An individual who is a victim of a violation of this chapter may bring a civil action against the perpetrator (or whoever knowingly benefits, or attempts or conspires to benefit, financially or by receiving anything of value from participation in a venture which that person knew or should have known has engaged in an act in violation of this chapter) in an appropriate district court of the United States and may recover damages and reasonable attorneys fees.”
We want you to feel the weight of three words in that sentence: knew or should have known. You do not have to prove a hotel executive at a corporate office sat in a conference room and signed off on trafficking. You have to prove the hotel, through the people who ran the property, was either told or saw enough that a reasonable person would have recognized what was happening and stopped it. The law does the rest.
Three elements, taken from the controlling federal case law, decide whether you can keep a hotel defendant in the case:
1. Knowingly benefited. The hotel took money from the rooms where you were sold. That is the easiest element to prove — every paid night is a receipt.
2. Participation in a venture. This is the contested element. The hotel has to have done more than rent a room. It has to have been part of the operation in some meaningful way — accepting the trafficker’s money repeatedly, providing keys without proper check-in, ignoring the pattern of men coming and going at all hours, or, as in B.J.’s case, having a manager who personally stepped in to sell the survivor when the trafficker was unavailable.
3. Knew or should have known. Constructive knowledge is enough. You do not have to prove a specific hotel employee can identify you by name. You have to prove the warning signs were so visible, and the pattern so consistent, that the hotel staff should have seen what was happening — and chose not to look.
If those three elements are present, the case against the hotel proceeds.
What Damages the Law Lets You Recover
Under 18 U.S.C. § 1595, you can recover your full damages plus your reasonable attorneys’ fees. The damages fall into three buckets, and we have to be honest with you about what each one looks like:
Actual (economic) damages. Lost wages if the trafficking took you out of school or work. The cost of the medical care you have needed and will continue to need. The cost of any therapy, psychiatric care, or substance-use treatment tied to what you lived through. These are documented with receipts and tax returns, and a jury awards them as proven.
Compensatory (non-economic) damages. The pain. The fear. The nightmares. The way your relationships broke or never formed. The career you could have had. The years you cannot get back. These are not on a receipt, but they are real, and juries award them. They are typically the largest single component of any trafficking verdict.
Punitive damages. This is where the conduct rises above ordinary negligence. When a hotel knew what was happening — through internal reports, prior complaints, or the visible red flags everyone ignored — and chose the room revenue over your safety, a jury is allowed to add punishment damages on top of compensation. Punitive damages exist to send a message that the conduct cannot happen again, and they are where cases with the worst corporate behavior get their power. A jury that hears about a hotel manager who personally stepped in to sell a survivor is exactly the kind of jury that adds significant punitive damages.
There is also the attorneys’ fees provision. We will get to that in a moment when we talk about how we get paid.
California’s Layer of Protection — Civil Code § 52.5 and How It Stacks on Top of the Federal Law
California adds its own layer on top of the federal TVPRA, and it matters in two ways.
First, California Civil Code § 52.5 is the state-law companion to the federal trafficking regime. It creates a private right of action for trafficking survivors and provides for actual damages, compensatory damages, and punitive damages against anyone who causes or contributes to trafficking, including those who benefit financially from it. We layer § 52.5 onto the federal TVPRA claim so that even if a defendant tries to argue around the federal statute, the state law keeps the courthouse door open and the full range of damages on the table.
Second, California law gives you one of the longest windows in the country to file. The federal TVPRA at 18 U.S.C. § 1595(c) gives you ten years from the date the cause of action arose, or ten years after your 18th birthday if you were a minor when the trafficking occurred. So if you were a child when it happened, your clock does not start until you turn eighteen — meaning a survivor trafficked at age 14 has until her 28th birthday under the federal statute, and California’s longer statute can extend that further. California’s statute of limitations for civil claims arising from personal injury caused by childhood sexual assault has been extended under the legislature’s recent reforms, and our office checks the specific date you became aware of both the injury and its cause to give you the precise answer for your case. We will not let a deadline quietly close your case; the moment you call, we run the calendar.
Third, California does not require a conviction of the trafficker before you can sue the hotel. You do not have to wait for the criminal case to end. You do not have to wait for an arrest. Your civil case against the hotel is independent of any criminal proceeding, and we can move it forward now. That distinction matters because criminal cases can take years, and we do not want you waiting that long.
How the Hotel Industry Builds Its Defense — and Why the Defense Is Weaker Than It Looks
The first thing the hotel’s lawyers will tell you is some version of: We are just the brand. We license our name. The local operator runs the property. We are not responsible for what happened in that building.
That defense has a name. It is the franchisor defense, and it is the central fight in this entire area of law. In Doe #1 v. Red Roof Inns, Inc., 21 F.4th 714 (11th Cir. 2021), the Eleventh Circuit dismissed the franchisor defendants because the plaintiffs had not plausibly alleged that the brand participated in the trafficking venture beyond receiving franchise fees. The case is a real win for hotel defense lawyers — but it is also the case that defines exactly what a plaintiff has to allege to keep the brand in the case, and it is not a high bar when the facts are right.
Look at what Judge Chesney held in B.J.’s case. The complaint alleged that the manager of the Studio 6 Concord personally stepped in to sell the survivor. That allegation made the franchisor defense fail, because once you allege that a corporate manager participated, you have alleged that the company — not just the building — was involved. The same kind of allegations can work in your case, depending on what happened at the property where you were held.
Three categories of franchisor exposure are now open:
Direct operational participation. A manager or staff member at the hotel was part of the trafficking operation. A manager arranged discounted rooms in exchange for sexual favors. A manager personally sold the survivor. A manager booked rooms, accepted cash from buyers, or coordinated with the trafficker on which rooms to use. In cases like this, the franchisor is in the case because its own employee did the acts that satisfy the TVPRA elements.
Constructive knowledge plus direct benefit. The hotel staff saw the red flags — cash payments, no ID checks, refuse-housekeeping, the same man checking in with different girls, men streaming in and out at all hours — and the hotel continued to take the money. This is the path B.J.’s case against Choice, Hilton, and Marriott ultimately failed on at the motion-to-dismiss stage (Judge Chesney found the allegations as to those brands did not rise above ordinary franchisor observations), but it is the path that survives when the complaint adds direct benefit allegations — such as revenue tracked specifically from the trafficker’s rooms, brand-required operational standards that were ignored, or internal complaint histories the brand had access to.
Brand control over operations. The hotel brand’s own standards — its training, its booking systems, its key-card and reservation systems, its required housekeeping protocols, its franchise-agreement quality controls — created a real operating relationship with the property. When the brand uses those systems to know everything about a property except the trafficking, that knowledge itself becomes the constructive-knowledge case.
We have handled cases in every one of these lanes. We will know within the first conversation which one fits your facts.
What “Knew or Should Have Known” Looks Like in a Real Case
The red flags the hospitality industry itself trains its staff to recognize are the constructive-knowledge proof. We look for them on the property’s own records, because they show up there first.
Cash-only payment for rooms. A property that allows and accepts repeated cash-only payments from the same individual, with no ID and no credit card on file, has chosen to not look at who is paying.
Refused housekeeping. When the trafficker tells the front desk that the room should not be entered, and the staff complies for days or weeks, the staff has chosen not to see what is happening inside.
Heavy, irregular foot traffic. Men coming and going from one room at all hours, with no luggage, no overnight bag, no hotel key other than the one given at check-in. The pattern is visible on the key-card system.
Multiple guests with no luggage, no ID, no presence at the front desk. The survivor is brought in through a side door, or up a back staircase, or directly into the room by the trafficker, and never appears at the desk. The desk staff does not see her because the desk staff is not looking.
A rotating parade of buyers. Same room, same trafficker, different man every few hours. This pattern is visible on the property’s own reservation and key-card records.
Fearful, controlled appearance. When hotel staff do see the survivor — because she is sent for ice, or food, or to use the ice machine — she is silent, scared, looking at the trafficker before speaking, unable to answer basic questions. The trafficking industry calls this the “look,” and trained hotel staff are taught to recognize it.
Prior complaints. The single most important piece of evidence. If a prior guest, a prior employee, a neighboring business, or a law-enforcement officer reported concerns about the property, that report goes directly to the constructive-knowledge element. Many hotels have internal incident reports about exactly these patterns. Those reports, when they exist, are case-winning documents.
Cash refunds and irregular billing. When a property reverses charges, writes off balances, or accepts post-stay payments in cash, it is hiding the financial trail of what was happening at the property. We find these records.
If any of this happened at the property where you were held, the proof exists in that hotel’s own records. We go get it.
The Evidence That Disappears in Weeks, Not Months
This is the part of the case that decides everything, and it is the part survivors almost never hear about until it is too late. The evidence that wins a hotel trafficking case is on a timer.
Hotel surveillance footage. Most properties record over their CCTV on a rolling loop of somewhere between thirty and ninety days. After that loop, the footage is gone — legally. The B.J. case against G6 is alive today in part because of preserved security video and housekeeping records. If the property where you were held did not preserve its video when the case began, the jury will never see it. The spoliation letter goes out the day you call us, and it goes out to the property, to the franchisor’s legal department, and to the property’s surveillance vendor directly.
Front-desk and PMS records. Every check-in, every key-card swipe, every room charge, every housekeeping note, every maintenance visit is in the property management system. These records are the heart of the constructive-knowledge proof. They are preserved on a litigation hold, but absent a hold, they are purged on the property’s regular retention cycle. Some chains keep them for years; some do not. We cannot know which yours was without preserving them.
Police call-for-service history. Public-records requests to the Concord Police Department and the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Office can produce call logs, incident reports, and CAD (computer-aided dispatch) records for the address. These records show whether police had been to the property, how often, and for what. They are durable, but they require a proper records request soon. California’s Public Records Act and the federal FOIA-equivalent state law give you the right to these records. We file those requests immediately.
Housekeeping and maintenance logs. The records that show refused housekeeping, unusual maintenance requests, or reported disturbances are the same records the property will say “we do not have” if no one asks in writing. We ask in writing.
Employee personnel files. The manager, the desk clerk, the housekeeping supervisor — their personnel files, training records, and disciplinary histories tell us whether they were trained on trafficking recognition, whether they had prior complaints, and whether the property disciplined anyone for what happened to you. These files are subject to the property’s HR retention cycle; the preservation letter covers them.
The spoliation letter is the first move. It is the single most important document we send. It freezes the evidence by putting the company on legal notice that destruction after that point is sanctionable, including the harshest sanction in federal practice — an adverse-inference instruction to the jury telling them to assume the missing evidence would have helped your side. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37(e) gives us that hammer, and we use it.
What Your Case Is Worth — Honestly
We will not tell you a number on a website that we have not earned the right to say to you in person. What we will tell you is the honest range based on what we know about the case type, the defendants, and the federal civil-rights litigation we have studied.
For hotel-trafficking cases that proceed past motion to dismiss against a corporate defendant, the realistic damages range, based on the verified verdict record in this area of law, runs from the low seven figures to the high seven figures and beyond. The active participation of a hotel manager in the trafficking — the precise fact pattern Judge Chesney held supports a claim against G6 in B.J.’s case — elevates the case from a “blind eye” theory to a “criminal complicity” theory. Cases with that profile have produced verdicts in the $15 million to $40 million-plus range when they reach a jury. The defense knows this. The defense will work to settle before that jury is empaneled, because the optics of a hotel manager selling a survivor in the building is the kind of fact pattern that produces a verdict the company cannot afford to let be public.
The defense will also try to settle before depositions. That is when the hotel’s lawyers start saying things like “we’d like to resolve this quietly,” and “we’d like to avoid the trauma of a trial.” That is when you need a lawyer who has done this before and who knows what the case is worth.
We will tell you what we believe your case is worth, in writing, before you sign anything.
How We Get Paid — and Why You Pay Nothing Up Front
We work on contingency. The number is 33.33% before trial, 40% if the case proceeds to trial, and the agreement is in writing before you sign anything. If we do not recover money for you, you owe us nothing. There is no hourly billing, no retainer, no expense charge that comes out of your pocket. We advance the costs of the case — the filing fees, the deposition transcripts, the expert witnesses, the trial exhibits — and we recover those costs only out of the recovery at the end.
That is the standard. It is also the only way we will take a trafficking case. We have seen survivors get pulled into fee arrangements with firms that charge them hourly, or that take a percentage of the recovery on top of attorney fees, or that require the survivor to pay costs out of pocket. None of that happens here. You pay nothing unless we win.
We also offer a free consultation. The first call costs you nothing. It is confidential. It is with a lawyer, not a screener. And if we are not the right firm for your case — if the timing, the venue, or the facts call for a different kind of help — we will tell you that and point you where we think you should go.
The Defense’s Playbook — and How We Beat It
When the hotel’s defense team and its commercial general liability carrier pick up the file, the moves are predictable. We have seen them enough times to write them down for you in advance. Here are the plays you can expect, and the counters we use.
Play 1: We are just the franchisor, not the operator. The brand points at the local operator, and the local operator points at the brand. We respond by pleading and proving the franchisor’s direct operational control: the brand’s reservation and PMS systems, its required training, its standards for staffing and security, its marketing that presents the property as the brand. When there is direct manager participation in the trafficking — as alleged in B.J.’s case — the franchisor defense collapses. We make sure the manager’s name, role, and acts are in the complaint from day one.
Play 2: We had no idea what was happening. This is the constructive-knowledge play, and it is where we do most of the work. We serve the spoliation letter, we obtain the prior complaints, we pull the police call-for-service history, we depose the front-desk staff under oath, and we put the red flags in front of the jury. A property that took cash from the trafficker every night for months is not a property that did not know.
Play 3: Quick settlement before depositions. This is the defense’s favorite play when the facts are bad. They offer a number that sounds large in the abstract but is a fraction of what the case is worth, and they offer it before the property’s lawyers are deposed, before the manager’s training record comes out, before the key-card data is produced. The temptation to settle and move on is real, and for some survivors it is the right choice. But we have to make sure you understand what you are giving up. A quick settlement buys you closure; a fully developed case buys you a number that funds your recovery. We will tell you which is which.
Play 4: Attack the survivor’s credibility. This is the cruelest play, and we will not sugarcoat it. The defense will look for inconsistencies in your recollection, gaps in the record, prior trauma, substance use, or any other fact they can use to suggest you are unreliable. The law of sex-trafficking cases has special rules for this — the federal Trafficking Survivors Protection Act was written with this dynamic in mind — and California’s evidentiary rules give us tools to keep the worst of this out of the jury’s view. The deeper answer is that we build the case so that the survivor’s story is corroborated by records, by witnesses, by the property’s own data. Your testimony is the spine; the records are the ribs.
Play 5: Move to compel arbitration. Some hotel registration paperwork and loyalty-program fine print contains an arbitration clause. The TVPRA itself contains a provision, 18 U.S.C. § 230(e)(5), that strips Section 230 immunity for trafficking claims — but that is about online platforms, not hotels. The arbitration fight is a different question, and it depends on what you signed. We will know the answer before you sign anything with us, and we will explain the implications.
Who We Are — The Lawyers Who Take This Case
Ralph Manginello is the managing partner. He has been a trial lawyer in this country for more than 27 years, since November 1998. He was a journalist before he was a lawyer, which means he learned to ask the question that is most often skipped — the one that matters most. He is admitted to practice in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas and the Texas state courts, and he has built a trial practice that focuses on cases that involve catastrophic injuries and corporate defendants with deep pockets and lawyers. He does not farm out the work on a trafficking case. He is the lawyer you will talk to, and he is the lawyer who will try your case if it goes to trial.
Lupe Peña is an associate attorney at the firm, and his background matters for a case like yours in a way that is not obvious at first. Before he joined us, Lupe spent years as an insurance-defense attorney at a national defense firm — the same rooms where adjusters and their software decide how to deny, delay, and devalue people exactly like you. He learned the insurance industry from the inside. He learned how Colossus and reserve-setting actually work. He learned how IME doctors are selected and how surveillance is conducted. He learned every tactic the other side is going to use on your case, and he now uses that knowledge for you. He is fluent in Spanish, and he conducts full client consultations in Spanish without an interpreter. We say that out loud because it matters to the families we serve — Hablamos Español, and we mean it.
When you call our office, you talk to a lawyer. Not a screener, not a case manager, not a paralegal. A lawyer. That is by design, because the first conversation about what happened to you shapes everything that follows.
What We Do the Moment You Call
We do not wait. The moment you tell us your story, the following happens, in this order, in the same week:
First, we run the calendar. We identify the federal TVPRA deadline, the California Civil Code § 52.5 deadline, and any other statute that might apply, and we map out where you are on each one. You will know in writing, in plain English, exactly how much time you have.
Second, we send the spoliation letter. Same day. To the property, to the franchisor, and to the property’s surveillance vendor. This freezes the evidence before it can cycle out.
Third, we file the public records requests. Concord Police Department, Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Office, and any other agency that may have records tied to the property. This is the part that builds the constructive-knowledge case.
Fourth, we sit down with you and your family — at our office, at your home, at a place you choose — and we walk through what we found. We bring the calendar, the records we have already obtained, the legal analysis, and our honest assessment of what your case is worth. We do this before you sign anything.
Fifth, we begin the case. Federal or state court, depending on what your facts call for. If you were trafficked at a Studio 6 in Concord, federal court in the Northern District of California is the venue Judge Chesney used in B.J.’s case, and we know that courthouse and those defense lawyers. If the facts of your case call for state court in Contra Costa County, we work with local counsel on a pro hac vice basis.
We do not fabricate that we have already done any of this on your case. We have not, because you have not yet called. The moment you call, we begin.
Frequently Asked Questions
What exactly is sex trafficking under federal law?
Sex trafficking under 18 U.S.C. § 1591 is the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, obtaining, patronizing, soliciting, or advertising of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act, where that act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or where the person is under 18 years of age (in which case force, fraud, and coercion do not have to be proven). In your case, if you were an adult, the trafficking typically involves force, threats, debt bondage, or psychological control. If you were a minor when the trafficking occurred, no force or coercion had to be present for it to qualify as trafficking under federal law.
Who can I sue — the hotel, the brand, or the trafficker?
All three, separately, in the same lawsuit. The trafficker under 18 U.S.C. § 1595 for the direct trafficking. The hotel property under § 1595 as a beneficiary of the trafficking venture. The brand — G6 Hospitality, Choice, Hilton, Marriott, or whichever company owned the flag on the property — under § 1595 if the brand’s involvement rises above mere franchisor status. You do not have to choose one defendant; you can name all of them, and the court will sort out who stays in the case based on the evidence.
How long do I have to file a trafficking case in California?
Under federal law, 18 U.S.C. § 1595(c), you have ten years from the date the cause of action arose, or ten years after your 18th birthday if you were a minor when the trafficking occurred. California adds another layer of time under Civil Code § 52.5, and California’s discovery-rule reforms for childhood sexual assault have extended the available window for survivors of trafficking that began as minors. The specific deadline for your case depends on when you became aware of both the injury and its cause, and we run that calculation for you the first time we talk.
What evidence do I need to prove the hotel knew what was happening?
You do not need to prove it yourself. The hotel’s own records are the evidence. The key-card swipe log shows who entered which room and when. The property management system shows cash-only check-ins, refused housekeeping, and irregular booking patterns. The housekeeping and maintenance logs show what staff saw. The police call-for-service history shows what was reported to law enforcement. The personnel files show what training the staff had on trafficking recognition and what disciplinary history the manager carried. We obtain all of this through the legal process — preservation letters, subpoenas, and depositions — and we put it in front of the jury.
Will my case settle or go to trial?
We do not know in advance, and neither does the defense. What we can tell you is that the same defense lawyers who file motions to dismiss in cases like B.J.’s also settle cases like B.J.’s before trial, because the corporate defendant knows what a jury verdict looks like when a jury hears a hotel manager personally sold a survivor in the building. Most federal trafficking cases against corporate defendants settle. The ones that go to trial tend to settle on the eve of trial. We prepare every case as if it will go to trial, because that is what produces the settlement that funds your recovery.
How much does it cost me to hire a lawyer for a trafficking case?
Nothing up front. We work on contingency. The agreement is 33.33% of the recovery before trial, 40% if the case proceeds to trial, and you owe us nothing if we do not recover money for you. We advance the costs of the case — filing fees, deposition transcripts, expert witnesses, exhibits — and those are recovered out of the recovery at the end. The free consultation costs you nothing and is confidential. Past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes, but we will show you what we have done in comparable cases before you sign anything.
What if the trafficker was convicted — does that help my civil case?
Yes. A criminal conviction of the trafficker is admissible in your civil case as evidence that the trafficking occurred, and it shortcuts the defense’s argument that you are exaggerating or misremembering. It does not end the civil case — the hotel is a separate defendant and has its own liability analysis — but it removes the most common credibility attack on the survivor’s story.
What if the trafficker was never convicted — can I still sue?
Yes. The criminal case and the civil case are completely separate. You do not need a conviction. You do not need an arrest. You do not need the police to have investigated. The civil case is decided on the lower “preponderance of the evidence” standard, not the criminal “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard. Many survivors bring civil cases years before any criminal case concludes, and many bring them when no criminal case was ever filed.
Can I remain anonymous if I file a civil case?
Federal civil cases use real names on the docket by default, but courts in trafficking cases routinely grant pseudonyms (like “B.J.” in the Concord case) to protect survivors from the retaliation and re-traumatization that can come from public filings. We will file the appropriate motion to protect your identity at the outset of your case.
What if I am not in California — can you still take my case?
It depends on where the trafficking occurred and where the hotel is located. The TVPRA allows suit in federal district court where the defendant resides or where the cause of action arose. We work trafficking cases across the country. If your case happened in a state where we are admitted, we handle it directly. If it happened in a state where we are not admitted, we work with local counsel on a pro hac vice basis so that the firm you hired is the firm running the case.
What is the difference between the TVPRA and a regular personal injury lawsuit?
A regular personal injury lawsuit would require you to prove the hotel was negligent — that it breached a duty of care and that the breach caused your injury. The TVPRA is different. It does not require you to prove negligence. It requires you to prove that the hotel knowingly benefited from a venture it knew or should have known was trafficking you. The federal standard is lower for the plaintiff in some respects, and the federal court is the forum. The damages available are broader, including punitive damages and attorneys’ fees. We bring TVPRA claims in addition to — not instead of — California state-law claims, so that we are using every available legal tool to recover what you are owed.
How is the hotel’s insurance company involved in my case?
Almost every hotel carries a commercial general liability (CGL) policy. The CGL policy is the first source of money for any settlement or judgment. The hotel’s insurer assigns a defense lawyer, and that defense lawyer works for the insurer, not for the hotel’s interest in keeping you whole. The insurer’s playbook is to settle low, fast, and quietly — before depositions, before the manager testifies, before the key-card data is produced. We work against that playbook. We do not let the insurer set the value of your case before the evidence is developed. Lupe Peña’s background as a former insurance-defense attorney is exactly what makes us effective at this — he knows the play before the other side runs it.
What if the property where I was trafficked has changed ownership?
We still pursue the case. A change of ownership does not erase the liability of the previous operator, the franchisor, or the brand. Under California law, the successor operator can inherit liability for prior conduct in many circumstances. We run the corporate-structure map to identify every entity in the chain, and we pursue them all.
Speak With Us Tonight
If you have read this far, you are not reading casually. You are considering whether to call. We want you to call. We want you to call tonight, before the evidence cycles out, before another week passes, before the deadline you cannot see moves another day closer.
The call is free. The call is confidential. The call is with a lawyer — not a screener, not a paralegal, not a salesperson. The call is in English or in Spanish. The number is 1-888-ATTY-911, which is 1-888-288-9911. We are available 24 hours a day, every day.
When you call, we will tell you three things on that first call: what the deadline is for your case, what evidence exists at the property right now that will be gone in weeks, and what your case is likely worth. We will tell you whether we are the right firm for you or whether you need a different kind of help. We do not take every case that comes through the door, but if we take yours, we will be the lawyers on it from the first preservation letter to the last witness stand.
Ralph Manginello has been doing this for 27 years. Lupe Peña knows how the other side’s insurance machine works because he used to run it. Hablamos Español. We are the trial team that takes California cases, and we will work with local counsel in the Northern District of California or Contra Costa County Superior Court as your case requires.
You are not alone in what happened in that hotel room. The law sees you. The federal court sees you. A jury will see you, if it comes to that. The first move is yours.
Call 1-888-ATTY-911 right now. The consultation is free. We do not get paid unless we win. Past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes.
If you want to understand more about how the hotel defense teams fight these cases, or how insurance carriers try to settle cheap, our YouTube channel covers these questions in plain language — the same language we use at your kitchen table. To learn more about the broader areas of practice our firm handles and how we work with survivors of catastrophic injury, start there. To meet the lawyers who will be on your case, see Ralph Manginello and Lupe Peña directly.
If you have lost a loved one to trafficking at a hotel, our wrongful-death practice is set up for that case too. If your case involves fighting the hotel’s insurance carrier directly, see how we handle denied or lowballed insurance claims.
When you are ready, contact our office. The first conversation is the one that starts the clock for your preservation letter. Make it tonight.