The good news for Lakireddy Bali Reddy Tuesday - he was freed on $10 million bond in his sex slavery case. The bad news - his son has been charged with encouraging foreigners to enter the United States illegally.
The wealthy 62-year-old realtor is accused of bringing teenage Indian girls into the U.S. under false pretenses and then using them for sex and labor. The San Jose Mercury News says he was freed after spending over a week in Oakland's North County Jail despite prosecutors arguing he might use his money and influence to escape and avoid a trial.
Reddy's son, Vijay Kumar Lakireddy, now faces charges as authorities seem to be expanding the investigation into this case, the paper says. ``God and truth are on my side,'' Vijay Lakireddy tells the Mercury News. He is free pending a detention hearing Jan. 29. The elder Reddy left jail late Tuesday afternoon, the paper says.
Reddy's being investigated both in the United States and his native India, where his home state Andhra Pradesh's chief minister Chandrababu Naidu has ordered a police investigation into his activities, the Mercury News says. This probe is part of a bid to protect the state's reputation as a high-tech hotbed and solid source for software engineers into the United States.
The Tuesday court session was jammed with Reddy's family and south Asian women's activists. The session had been postponed from the previous week so the court could learn more about Reddy's global assets, with prosecutors saying he owns over $50 million in Berkeley property alone and might have hidden holdings, according to the Mercury News.
Reddy, however, testified under oath that outside the U.S. he has only properties in India worth less than $1 million. That didn't stop a judge from ordering Reddy and a dozen relatives to surrender their passports, asking family members to sign the bond, and advising them that if Reddy disappears, they'd be liable for the full $10 million, the paper says.
Reddy's and his extended family's assets also were frozen while the case is pending. Reddy is remanded to his brother's custody in Merced and abides by a nightly curfew beginning at 10 p.m., the paper continues. And he's not allowed to visit his East Bay properties or businesses, including the popular Pasand restaurant.
The case began with the accidental carbon monoxide death of a 16 year old girl and the non-fatal poisoning of her 15 year old sister at one of Reddy's Berkeley properties. Police got an anonymous tip leading them to question her alleged parents - who were said to have admitted they were actually siblings brought to the U.S. and paid by Reddy to pose as the parents, the Mercury News says.
Police subsequently discovered a purported scheme involving Reddy's bringing workers to the U.S. with high-tech H-1B visas and putting them to work in his businesses. He's accused of having sex with three teenagers, including the girl who died. The surviving girls, the Mercury News says, reportedly told authorities they were sold to Reddy by poor parents in his native town Velveddam.
Tuesday was the first time Reddy's son was mentioned by name in the case. The Mercury News says very few details of Vijay Lakireddy's involvement are available - though he had a prior run-in with law enforcement over a crack cocaine possession guilty plea in 1991. He got a suspended sentence and performed an 18-month diversion treatment program, the paper says.
