Human trafficker charged with new Berkeley sex crime case
Police said a Flock alert on Arman Stewart's license plate helped authorities find and arrest him this week.
A convicted human trafficker from Oakland is back in custody this week in connection with new Berkeley sex crime allegations.
According to police, 27-year-old Arman Stewart "forced his way into an apartment where the victim was staying," on Berkeley Way near Ohlone Park, on Friday, Sept. 19.
After he got inside, authorities said, Stewart sexually assaulted the woman, threatened her with a gun, beat her up and took $1,100 from her via Apple Pay.
In the days that followed, Berkeley police said, Stewart assaulted the woman again "in another jurisdiction."
The two have had a multi-year dating relationship with ongoing domestic violence incidents around the state, BPD wrote in court papers.
As part of the investigation, BPD secured an arrest warrant for Stewart and put his car into the system as a wanted vehicle.
On Tuesday, Fremont police picked up Stewart in their city after getting a Flock alert on his license plate, according to charging papers.
After his arrest, authorities searched his Oakland home, finding two AK-style firearms as well as a semiautomatic pistol, all loaded, police wrote.
Police noted in charging papers that Stewart was prohibited from owning guns due to an earlier human trafficking conviction.
Read more about sex crimes in Berkeley.
In that case, from 2017, according to court records reviewed by The Scanner, Stewart set a 17-year-old girl on fire in Oakland a week after he and an accomplice began pimping her.
Stewart was 18 at the time.
The pair was charged with torture, the human trafficking and pimping of a minor and pandering by encouragement.
After a plea deal in 2018, Stewart was sentenced to 12 years in prison to be served at half-time, according to court records.
In a statement to the court during the subsequent sentencing hearing, the girl's mother said her daughter had naively believed Stewart was her boyfriend.
She described how Stewart had burned her daughter's face, neck and body, wounding her and traumatizing her, causing lasting damage.
Arman Stewart. BPD
"You exploited her," she told him, leading to PTSD and erratic behavior. She said her daughter had been "a popular, outgoing, and fearless girl prior to her involvement with you.… And now she isolates herself from others, filled anxiety and paranoia."
On Thursday, the Alameda County district attorney's office charged Stewart in the new Berkeley case with domestic violence, robbery, assault with a firearm, burglary, forcible oral copulation, forcible rape, possession of a firearm by a felon and possession of ammunition by a prohibited person, according to charging papers.
He was arraigned Thursday and is set to return to court Oct. 16 for an attorney and plea hearing.
He is being held at Santa Rita Jail in Dublin and appears to be ineligible for bail, according to booking records.
Sexual violence support resources
- Sexual Assault Response and Recovery Team (SARRT): 510-534-9290 (24/7)
- BRAVE Bay Area: 510-800-4247 (24/7)
- RAINN: National Sexual Assault Hotline
- Get help via online chat or WhatsApp
- Get help via text: Text HOPE to 64673
- Call the telephone hotline: 800-656-4673
- Learn more about RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network)
