Mum, 37, makes £250k a year running prostitute ring and boasted ‘I’m brilliant’

Catalina Cojocaru and her boyfriend Jamie Dunn made £20,000 a month by bringing the sex workers to the UK and forcing the women to engage in off-street prostitution in brothels in the Midlands

A mother who helped start a huge prostitution ring that smuggled women into the UK boasted how “brilliant” she was before she was jailed.

The despicable Catalina Cojocaru, 37, and boyfriend Jamie Dunn, 42, raked in £250,000 by exploiting the vulnerable women for sex.

She smuggled prostitutes into the UK and told them to “look pretty” as the shameless couple lived a luxurious lifestyle after working with other members of his own family to hire sex workers.

The group induced mainly Romanian women to travel from their home countries, forcing them to engage in off-street prostitution in brothels in the Midlands.

A court heard Dunn and Cojocaru started their businesses in Northampton before expanding to Nottingham and Birmingham and soon making £20,000 a month.

Dunn placed online ads on a sex worker website to attract customers and was also responsible for procuring the properties that would later be used as brothels.

Cojocaru sourced women from Europe who traveled to the UK as sex workers and took over the day-to-day operations.

A court was told she wanted women to “do their best” and if she requested semi-nude photos she would tell them to “look sexy” and wear makeup.

Police recovered lists and text messages showing that Cojocaru acted as the “boss” of the sex workers, having daily contact with them and keeping records of daily earnings.

Evidence showed that amount was up to £1,640 a day, of which the gang took 50 per cent off each woman between November 2015 and January 2017.

On a day when seven women made £900, she captioned the diary: “F**k me, I’m brilliant.”

Dunn’s elderly father Martin Dunn, 74, was also involved in the conspiracy, as did Cojocaru’s brother Andrei Cojocaru, 26, Dunn Snr, paid for airline tickets for women coming to the UK, helped pick them up from airports and even funded hotels and serviced apartments .

Andrei Cojocaru was found with 12 cell phones, seven of which had the sex workers’ names on the back so he knew which booking was for which woman.

He would liaise with clients and show them to the property, charge cell phones and collect the trafficked women from airports.

Dunn and Cojocaru, who lived in the posh village of Lower Harlestone in Northampton, where house prices average £900,000, were accused of trafficking women into Britain.

Both admitted they conspired on two counts to arrange or facilitate another person’s travel to the UK to exploit them for prostitution.

Dunn was sentenced to four years and nine months in prison, while Cojocaru was sentenced to three years and nine months in prison at Northampton Crown Court. Judge Rebecca Crane said: “They exploited the work of others for substantial financial gain and the business would have gone on had the police not intervened.”

Martin Dunn, from Northampton, was given a 12-month community decree and 100 hours of unpaid labor to acquire criminal property after falling into a large sum of money following a home sale.

Andrei Cojocaru, also from Northampton, was sentenced to a year in prison suspended for 14 months plus 150 hours of unpaid work for conspiring to control prostitution for wages.

The convictions, which were part of Operation Eton, were the first modern slavery and human trafficking charges secured by Northamptonshire Police Inspector Carrie Powers, who said: “This has been a very complex and lengthy investigation but I’m really pleased that we were able to secure the force’s first charges under modern slavery law and find ourselves guilty of all four perpetrators.

“This organized crime gang has been exploiting vulnerable women with false promises of a better life in Britain.

“Instead, they forced her to have sex with large numbers of men with no regard for their rights or welfare.

“These women worked long hours just to get a large chunk of their earnings from the gang, which was then used to fund a luxurious lifestyle.

“Investigating these types of cases may be complex, but Northamptonshire Police are absolutely committed to fighting modern slavery and bringing those who exploit vulnerable members of our community to justice.”