Tal, Alon and Oren Alexander should be sentenced for sex trafficking

Three brothers who once lived at the pinnacle of wealth and society in New York and Miami could face life in prison for sex trafficking more than a dozen women and girls when they are sentenced Tuesday in Manhattan federal court.

Earlier this year, a jury convicted Tal, Alon and Oren Alexander on all counts, including sex trafficking and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking. At trial, prosecutors presented evidence showing that the brothers for years used their wealth and social status to lure women to lavish parties or vacation destinations, drug them, then violently rape and sexually assault their victims — many of whom were unconscious or severely disabled.

Before their arrest, Tal, 40, and Oren, 39, were best known for growing the luxury real estate sector in New York. Alon, Oren’s twin, was an executive in the family security company and hung in the same social circles as his brothers.

More than 70 women came forward to investigators, providing harrowing accounts of the brothers’ attacks, prosecutors said in their sentencing memo. Ultimately, 11 women testified during the five-week trial about being sexually assaulted by one or more of the Alexander brothers. Several are expected to address the court during sentencing Tuesday.

Prosecutors want the three men to spend the rest of their lives in federal prison. The Alexanders’ lawyers are seeking the lowest possible sentence of 15 years and deny that the men ever drugged or raped women.

The assaults took place at luxury locations in the Hamptons, Aspen, Manhattan, the Bahamas and on a Caribbean cruise. The convictions are related to crimes committed between 2008 and 2021, but prosecutors say the serial rapes and sexual assaults date back to 2001 or 2002, when the brothers were still in high school.

Trial evidence showed the brothers recorded some of the assaults they committed – often together or with other men in videos and photographs – and shared them with each other and their friends. The jury saw some of that evidence, which was recovered from the men’s devices years after the recorded assaults.

One victim, who was 17 when she was drugged by Oren Alexander, said she only learned she had been raped when she was contacted by government investigators who identified her in a 2009 recording.

All three men were convicted of sex trafficking, conspiracy to commit sex trafficking, and inciting travel for illegal sexual activity. Alon and Tal Alexander were also convicted of sex trafficking of a minor. The twins were convicted of additional counts of sexual abuse, and the jury also found Oren Alexander guilty of sexual exploitation of a minor.

Prosecutors believe the seriousness of the crimes warrants the maximum sentence possible. Their sentencing memo cites sentencing enhancements that the government says should weigh in favor of longer prison terms, such as for victims who were particularly vulnerable as minors or because they were drugged or unconscious, and the use of force and physical restraint during sexual assaults.

When Alon and Oren were nearly 30 years old, they drugged and sexually assaulted high school students in Aspen in January 2017, evidence revealed at trial. In August 2016, when Tal was 30, he assaulted an 18-year-old, prosecutors say., although the woman did not testify at the trial.

One woman testified that she wrote “rapists” with eyeliner on the wall of their Hamptons rental in 2009 after seeing two of the brothers drag a drunk woman to the hot tub and take turns raping her.

Prosecutors, who say the men have expressed no remorse, have asked federal Judge Valerie Caproni to sentence all of the men to life in prison.

“They were not party animals, playboys, womanizers or wayward young men. They were predators. They spent years preying on and preying on women because they wanted to, because they could, and because they continued to get away with it,” the government’s sentencing memo says.

Brothers are now ‘devoted husbands and fathers,’ defense says

The brothers’ lawyers say they did not drug or rape any of the women they had sex with, but admitted in court that their conduct was sometimes insensitive.

“They apologize to the women they insulted or offended,” their lawyers wrote. “The evidence at trial showed that virtually all of the women who testified had been drinking alcohol. The centerpiece of the government’s case is that the defendants surreptitiously drugged women. The Alexander brothers deny this completely and categorically,” their lawyers wrote.

The defense asked the judge to sentence the brothers to 15 years in prison, the lightest sentence possible for a conviction on one count of sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion.

A longer sentence, they argued, would be irrelevant to the sentences given to those convicted of murder by the state, who serve an average of 15 years.

The brothers’ legal team is challenging the sex trafficking law used to prosecute the brothers, arguing that their conduct falls short of what the law was intended to punish — people who force women into prostitution or engage in commercial sex acts. They also argued that some of the admitted evidence was “remarkably weak.”

“He was charged in a sex trafficking case and tried as a federal rape case,” Marc Agnifilo, who represents Oren Alexander, said at a hearing last week. “We will have a lot to say about that on sentencing day.”

The lawyers also argued that the brothers, who married in recent years and had children, should not spend their lives behind bars because they are “devoted husbands and fathers” and necessary to their family. More than three dozen letters from friends, family and neighbors describing their generosity and kindness were submitted.

Lawyers argued that the alleged plot ended when the brothers married, so they were no longer a risk to the community.