Alexander brothers' fresh bid for bail denied in sex trafficking case

MANHATTAN (CN) — A federal appellate court has denied bail for Oren, Alon and Tal Alexander, a trio of wealthy brothers accused of using their status to rape and traffic dozens of women.

The Alexander brothers offered to fund private security to monitor their home to avoid jail before trial, but U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni, a Barack Obama appointee, rejected the plan. On Tuesday, a Second Circuit panel upheld her decision, finding the brothers are “both a danger to the community and a flight risk if they were released pretrial.”

“Given its finding that defendants-appellants posed a danger to others, the district court did not err in finding that private detention would be inappropriate,” the circuit court ruled in a five-page order.

U.S. Circuit judges Steven Menashi and Richard Sullivan, Donald Trump appointees, as well as U.S. Circuit Judge Gerald Lynch, a Barack Obama appointee, were behind the ruling.

At oral arguments last week, Lynch questioned the brothers’ attorneys on the proposed private detention.

“The bail package that was offered seems to concede that the only way that the community can be protected and a flight risk can be avoided is by a system of 24-hour surveillance by armed guards,” the judge said.

Tal Alexander’s attorney, Milton Williams, maintained that the proposed bail package was a legitimate effort to ensure compliance with release conditions, not an attempt to leverage financial resources for leniency. However, the judges questioned whether wealth should influence decisions regarding public safety.

“If dangerousness is the ground on which bail is being denied, you can’t say, ‘I know he’s a danger — he’s Jack the Ripper — but he’s got enough money that we can put him in a gilded cage,’” Sullivan said.

Alon Alexander’s attorney, Howard Srebnick, objected to the analogy, calling it “terribly unfair,” and argued that prosecutors were unfairly targeting the brothers because of their financial means. Sullivan responded, “The court detained your client because he’s dangerous. That’s not wealth. Lots of poor people are dangerous, too.”

The judges came to the same conclusion in their Tuesday ruling, finding that Caproni “did not rely primarily” on the Alexanders’ wealth in finding that they posed a flight risk.

Attorneys for the Alexanders didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.

The three brothers were charged at the end of 2024 with sex trafficking several victims, including at least one minor. Prosecutors say they used their wealth to lure and drug women at their properties before engaging in violent sexual assaults.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Kaiya Arroyo told the circuit court last week that some of their victims were “held down and screaming for them to stop,” while others “had been incapacitated by drugs and were incapable of saying ‘no.’”

Federal agents arrested the brothers in December in Miami. Prior to their arrests, Oren and Tal Alexander were two of the most prominent real estate agents for luxury properties in New York and Miami. Alon Alexander was a well-known socialite who ran in the same circles.

They were initially charged with sex trafficking of two victims. But a pair of superseding indictments have been tacked on since then, bringing the number of charged victims up to seven, with at least one of them being a minor.

Follow @Uebey Follow @uebey.bsky.social