More child sex trafficking charges filed against Tri-Cities business owner
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- Prosecutors added 10 charges against a Tri‑Cities owner, raising the count to 21.
- Allegations claim minors from Honduras faced forced labor and sexual exploitation.
- Wife faces obstruction and harboring charges as both remain jailed pending trial.
The owner of a Tri-Cities construction company faces 10 more federal charges, for a total of 21, in a case of alleged sex trafficking and forced labor in Eastern Washington.
Jonathan Michael Atkinson’s wife, Yamilex Atkinson, also faces additional allegations, with two new charges bringing her total to four.
The new charges filed against Jonathan Atkinson, 35, include more alleged victims, plus a new charge of possession of child pornography.
He is accused of grooming boys in Honduras for sex trafficking in the Tri-Cities.
The minors he brought to the Tri-Cities worked at his construction company, CRS Crossroad Services, for unfair wages and were forced to engage in sexual acts, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Laurel Holland at a 2025 hearing.
In April 2025, officers with the Benton County Sheriff’s Office, Homeland Security Investigations and the Southeast Regional Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force swarmed a multi-family housing building owned by the Atkinsons on the 700 block of Elm Avenue in Pasco.
Days later Jonathan Atkinson pleaded innocent to charges that included forced labor; trafficking with respect to forced labor; sex trafficking of children by force, fraud and coercion; production of child pornography; online enticement of a minor and harboring illegal residents.
Holland said Atkinson, who was born in Alabama, found children living in Honduras as young as 8 and provide them with housing, schooling, food and gifts, such as electronic devices.
Then he would force them to participate in sexual activities, and he told them they must send him sexually explicit videos and pictures if they wanted to come to the United States, according to Holland and court documents.
When they arrived in the United States, the boys lived in apartments owned by the Atkinsons, Holland said.
If they refused to do what Jonathan Atkinson said, he would threaten to contact immigration and to release videos of them to the pastor of the church they attended, Holland said.
Victims called Atkinson “father” and he called them “son,” she said.
They were required to provide Atkinson with private information such as their cellphone location and passwords to their social media accounts, according to a court document.
They were completely dependent on the Atkinsons, Holland said.
Yamilex Atkinson charges
Immediately after Atkinson was booked into the Benton County jail as a federal prisoner after the raid on Elm Avenue, he began seeking phone numbers for witnesses and victims, according to a court document.
His wife’s phone had been seized, but he called a witness to obtain her new number. She told him in a call that she would reach out and ask for letters of support, Holland said.
Instead, she allegedly tried to undermine witnesses, according to information at a court hearing.
Prosecutors allege that Yamilex Atkinson, 30, removed victims from a hotel where law enforcement officers had taken them, according to a court document.
She was charged in 2025 with obstructing the investigation into both trafficking related to forced labor and also sex trafficking of children by force, fraud and coercion. She has pleaded innocent.
This month she also was charged with two counts of harboring illegal residents. She is scheduled to make her initial court appearance on the new charges this week.
Both Jonathan and Yamilex Atkinson are being held in the Benton County jail. Jonathan Atkinson’s trial is set for June 8.