Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg
Photo by Dean Moses
A department of corrections employee and her inmate lover were indicted Tuesday for running a prostitution ring that included pimping out a child.
The disturbing allegations unfolded throughout the latter half of 2025 and involved State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision worker Deanna Dicastro, 39, and her 38-year-old partner, Gilliam Cordero.
According to statements made on the record, the pair, who had been dating for about four years when they signed up for the hookup, classified website Megapersonals on Oct. 8, where they posted prostitution advertisements, including that of an underage girl in her teens. Court records show that the pair texted the teen and other females, ordering them to hotels in Manhattan and the Bronx where they performed sex acts.
Prosecutors said that the crimes were that much more disturbing since Dicastro worked at the Central NY Psychiatric Center in Marcy, a max security facility where inmates with mental illness can be involuntarily committed and sex offenders civilly confined. Cordero, on the other hand, was described as a violent felon. He was serving time for a gunpoint robbery in 2012, during which he and two other gang members from the Mac Ballers, forced the victim to strip naked and then stole all of his belongings at gunpoint. While he was being arrested for that case, he tried to escape court officers and injured them, for which he was slapped with Assault in the Second Degree. He was paroled in September.
Court records show that on Nov. 16, Dicastro ordered Cordero to rob a person at gunpoint, during which he threatened to shoot them if they did not hand over their belongings.
“As alleged, a DOCCS employee and her significant other ran a prostitution operation that spanned from Manhattan to upstate New York,” District Attorney Alvin Bragg said. “Disturbingly, that included the trafficking of at least one child. This investigation is active and ongoing. We urge anyone with information to call our Human Trafficking Unit at 212-335-3400.”
Prosecutors also said that much of the illicit operation was performed under Dicastro’s name, including using her vehicle to transport those sex trafficked and even obtaining a firearm thanks to her role as a DOCCS supervisor.
Both Dicastro and Cordero pleaded not guilty. ADAs John Fuller and Caroline Rowley requested that both defendants be remanded. Cordero was remanded, while bail for DiCastro was set at $500k cash/$750k bond/$1 million partially secured surety bond.
