An employee of the Department of Homeland Security was among 16 men arrested last week in a sex trafficking operation in Minnesota looking to catch suspects allegedly soliciting sex from minors.
Alexander Steven Back, 41, was arrested in the multiagency sting dubbed "Operation Creep," according to Bloomington Police Chief Booker Hodges. The men were arrested under suspicion of trying to solicit sex from someone they believed to be a 17-year-old girl.
Officials listed Back as an auditor for Homeland Security Investigations and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Court records were not immediately available for Back; NBC affiliate KARE of Minneapolis reported Tuesday that the men had not yet been charged.
"When he was arrested, he said, 'I'm ICE, boys,'" Hodges told reporters on Tuesday.
A spokesperson for ICE told NBC News on Wednesday that Back was hired in 2022 as an auditor for I-9 forms, or employment eligibility verification forms. Back was not a law enforcement officer with the agency, the spokesperson added.
“Following his arrest, ICE immediately placed Alexander Back on administrative leave," the spokesperson said. "ICE is working with local authorities as well as conducting its own investigation via the agency’s Office of Professional Responsibility.”
Hodges explained that the operation involved officers monitoring websites and apps that are allegedly used to purchase sex from trafficked individuals.
“If you want to purchase sex from a trafficked person, you would call a number or go on the website,” Hodges said. “That website would get answered by a person in a different country, that person in a different country would call the handler here and arrange for the meeting with the sex worker.”
It’s a “sophisticated” process that can be difficult to bust, Hodges said. The 16 men arrested were engaged in conversations with a police “decoy” and were arrested when they arrived at a hotel to meet with the person they believed to be an underage girl.
Back was arrested on Thursday and released after posting a $75,000 bond on Saturday, according to Hennepin County jail records. He did not immediately return a phone call and email requesting comment from NBC News on Wednesday.
Jail records state that Back had been formally charged with at least one count of prostitution. The office for the Hennepin County Attorney did not immediately respond to a request for more information on the case from NBC News.
