UPDATE:

After more than two months of extensive searching by our office’s Investigations team, in collaboration with the Regional Human Exploitation and Trafficking Unit, the US Marshals, and local law enforcement in Las Vegas, Reginald Ellis has been located and was arrested in Las Vegas earlier this morning.

Ellis will be extradited back to Washoe County likely within the next 30 days. He will be sentenced by the Honorable Judge Connie Steinheimer when he is back in the area.

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Original Release, September 19, 2024: 

A Reno man who was found guilty last night of Sex Trafficking of a Child Under 16, Sex Trafficking of a Child Under 14 and Child Abuse Involving Sexual Exploitation, has fled the area. Reginald Ellis (dob 12/9/86) was last seen Wednesday evening around 5:30, while awaiting a verdict in his jury trial case. Despite an objection raised by the District Attorney’s Office, the defendant was previously released on his own recognizance by the Reno Justice Court in January of last year.

Ellis had been arrested in June of 2022 after a detective with the Human Exploitation and Trafficking (HEAT team) was contacted about a 16-year-old girl who had been admitted to a local hospital. During the course of the investigation with the victim, it was discovered that Ellis had been prostituting the girl and beating her. Detectives also learned that the defendant was grooming the victim’s 14-year-old sister to also be sex trafficked.

If anyone has any information regarding the whereabouts of Reginald Ellis, you’re asked to contact the Reno Police Department’s non-emergency line at (775) 334-2121.