A California man has been arrested after he allegedly kidnapped a teenager, fed him Adderall, forced the child to sell clothes online and abandoned him on the side of a freeway.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office announced in a press release that Brandon Holguin has been charged with one count each of child stealing, human trafficking, child abuse under circumstances likely to cause great bodily injury or death, furnishing a minor a controlled substance, employing a minor during unauthorized hours and false personation for a written instrument.
Holguin, 26, was arrested following incidents that took place beginning on May 2, 2025, at a motel and other locations in Los Angeles County.
He allegedly targeted a 14-year-old boy at a thrift store several months before the trafficking began. Prosecutors said that Holguin then allegedly drove to the motel, where he put the victim to work “sorting and photographing used clothing items for online resale.”
“He allegedly instructed the victim to ingest a controlled substance containing amphetamine commonly known as Adderall — which made the victim sick — so the victim could work late,” prosecutors said.
Holguin initially kept the victim’s cellphone in his possession so the minor could not contact his family. The defendant then allegedly told the minor that they needed to get rid of his phone so he “could not be tracked by his mother.”
He eventually sold the victim’s phone and used a fake ID to pawn the victim’s jewelry, and he got hundreds of dollars in return.
Authorities said that Holguin allegedly intended to traffic the boy hundreds of miles away into Northern California, per the release.
However, the plan fell through and Holguin left the minor “alone on the side of a Los Angeles freeway in the middle of the night” on May 5, 2025, “driving away with the proceeds of the sales of the victim’s phone and jewelry.”
The victim made his way off the freeway and went to a nearby business to call 911.
Shortly after the boy was reunited with his family, LAPD officers set out on a search for Holguin and he was arrested on May 9, 2025.
Holguin was arraigned on the initial charges and pleaded not guilty. As the investigation continued into the case, prosecutors filed additional charges by way of criminal information.
He was arraigned on Wednesday, May 6, and pleaded not guilty to the additional charges, according to the release.
Holguin is currently being detained on a $652,000 bond in the North County Correctional Facility in Castaic.
“Human labor traffickers frequently target vulnerable children, gaining their trust before isolating them and profiting from the child’s forced labor,” Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan J. Hochman said in a statement. “For three terrifying days, the victim’s parents and law enforcement desperately searched for this missing teen, fearing the worst had happened.”
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