Campbell was making a small fortune when he was arrested almost three years ago.
Tattoos, such as a mini-manifesto on one young woman's back, made it clear that that Campbell considered them his property. The women had come to the U.S. seeking better lives. Campbell ended up being their gateway to a living hell.
"It's been a long, emotional, difficult case, especially for the victims who had to stand before the person who abused them and tell the story once again and relive those moments," said Diane MacArthur, Asst. U.S. attorney.
During a day-long sentencing Monday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Grimes said that Campbell forced women to their knees to bow to him as God. If he was ever released from prison he would be an extreme danger, being a predator is in the man's DNA, Grimes said.
Campbell, 47, who went by the nicknames Daddy and Cowboy, ran a so-called massage parlor in Mt. Prospect.
One of his girls, Nicole, whom he called "Trinity" testified Monday she brought in up to $1,500 a day and turned all of over to Campbell, who gave her only meal money.
Campbell told the court he was innocent and being persecuted because he is black.
Judge Robert Gettleman told him, "You considered these people your property... they have a life sentence, all of them."
And then Gettleman handed Campbell a life sentence of his own saying, "You read the pimp's bible. I hope you will find another bible."
"The advisory sentencing guideline range indicated life imprisonment but per statutes, for the most serious of the charges, a 15-year minimum. Our request per our filings was for a 15-year sentence," said Mark Kusatzky, Campbell's attorney.
'I've been in law enforcement for almost 25 years, and this is one of the most significant human traffic cases I've seen in my career," said Gary J. Hartwig, Dept. of Homeland Security.
This case started as a domestic battery in 2009 -- a complaint from one of the prostitutes that Campbell had beaten. Cook County sheriff's investigators realized that there was much more to this; the feds got involved and the operation was shut down. According to sheriff's investigators, that initial victim came to America from the Ukraine where she had obtained her master's degree in teaching.
