A Florida woman who was convicted of the forced labor of a Mexican woman whom she had hired as a pregnancy surrogate has been sentenced to seven years in federal prison.
Esthela Clark was sentenced Thursday in federal court in Jacksonville. She pleaded guilty last year and faces deportation to Mexico after her prison sentence.
Federal prosecutors say Clark traveled to Mexico where she met the victim in 2012.
Clark promised the woman thousands of dollars to be her pregnancy surrogate once a baby was born. The woman was smuggled into the United States. Once in Jacksonville, Clark repeatedly tried to inseminate her with sperm retrieved from her boyfriend's condoms using a syringe.
Prosecutors say when that method failed, Clark forced the woman to have unprotected sex with strangers.
