CHICAGO – Word was already spreading in the Chinese community in early 2022 about a federal agent who was raping and robbing sex workers at gunpoint when a plot was privately hatched to lure the perpetrator to a neutral location and offer him a deal: free sex if he stopped attacking women, federal prosecutors say.

Luis Uribe, a veteran U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent, allegedly took the bait.

On March 23, 2022, Uribe agreed to meet a woman whom he’d previously paid for sex at the Royal Seafood Buffet in Hoffman Estates, where she snapped a photo of him next to a platter of what appeared to be steamed crawfish, prosecutors alleged.

Uribe accepted the deal — but he didn’t hold up his end of the bargain. That fall, he robbed and raped another victim at a hotel in Schaumburg, prosecutors alleged. When police showed up to interview the woman and her friend, they provided the photograph from the seafood buffet. That image, coupled with forensic evidence collected from the hotel room, would soon break the investigation open.

On Tuesday, Uribe is scheduled to go on trial at the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse on a federal indictment charging him with 10 counts of deprivation of rights under color of law, and one count of brandishing a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence.

The indictment alleged Uribe used his service weapon and badge to force four victims — who were all of Chinese descent — to submit to sex or provide him with cash on six separate occasions in 2022. One of the four victims was attacked three different times, according to the indictment.

At the time of the alleged offenses, Uribe, who is also a U.S. Marines veteran, was assigned primarily to the Customs and Border Patrol’s offices at O’Hare International Airport, working on both customs and immigration issues, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

Though the alleged incidents all took place years before Operation Midway Blitz put a spotlight on Border Patrol’s operations in Chicago, the indictment was filed in December 2025, making the lurid charges against Uribe another black eye for the agency as the Trump administration’s immigration campaign was still dominating headlines.

Since the charges were brought, another strange nexus to Midway Blitz has been revealed: the same grand jury that indicted Uribe also brought the “Broadview Six” case against immigration protesters that later fell apart on the eve of trial due to alleged prosecutorial misconduct in the grand jury sessions.

Even though different prosecutors handled the two investigations, Uribe’s lawyers recently asked for the indictment in his case to be dismissed, saying the alleged misconduct effectively poisoned the entire well.

U.S. District Judge Jorge Alonso denied the motion after agreeing to review the grand jury transcripts in Uribe’s case and finding there was no evidence of any inappropriate grand jury conduct there.

Last week, Uribe’s lawyer, Michael Clancy, filed a long-shot motion to reconsider that the judge will likely address before jury selection begins Tuesday.

The trial is expected to last up to two weeks and will feature the testimony of all four alleged victims, as well as an expert in sex trafficking who will offer details of how sex workers particularly in the Chinese community often rely on private networks to deal with crimes against them before going to police.

The woman who met with Uribe at the seafood buffet in 2002 is also expected to be a key prosecution witness.

If convicted Uribe faces a mandatory minimum seven years in federal prison and a maximum of life.

The Department of Homeland Security has declined to comment directly on Uribe’s case, citing federal privacy laws. In a statement after Uribe’s arrest, the agency said CBP “takes all allegations of employee misconduct seriously.”

“Overall, CBP employees, officers and agents perform their duties with honor and distinction, working tirelessly every day to keep our country safe,” the statement read. “CBP is committed to ensuring that all employees are held to the highest standards of integrity, professionalism, and personal conduct.”

According to the charges, the first attack occurred in February 2022 at a Schaumburg hotel where one woman, identified only as Victim A, had come from out of state to work in the sex trade.

“One day, while at the hotel, Victim A heard a knock at the door and opened the door,” prosecutors alleged in the filing. “It was (Uribe), who pushed his way into her room and displayed what Victim A described as an ID card with his picture on it.”

Uribe “stated that he was a police officer, that he was investigating Victim A, and that she needed to cooperate with him,” the prosecution filing said.

Uribe then pushed the woman onto the bed and put his gun to her head and ordered her to perform oral sex, prosecutors said. The victim begged him to stop and offered him money, which he eventually accepted. As he left the room, Uribe “pointed his gun at Victim A and told her not to look at him,” prosecutors said.

Another woman, Victim B, was staying at a hotel in Naperville when Uribe forced his way into her room, identified himself as police, demanded cash and sexually assaulted her, prosecutors said.

That victim later moved to a different room because of the attack, but Uribe “victimized her again” in that room as well, prosecutors said. Victim B then switched hotels and planned to leave Chicago, but before she escaped Uribe sexually attacked her a third time, striking her in the face when she screamed, prosecutors said.

On Oct. 2, 2022, Uribe attacked a third woman, Victim C, at a hotel in Schaumburg, again brandishing his gun and badge and demanding cash and sex, prosecutors said. Two days later, Schaumburg police interviewed that victim and collected forensic evidence from the room.

Tollway records analyzed by the FBI showed Uribe had left work at O’Hare that day and traveled toward Schaumburg, prosecutors said in the filing. While on the highway, he allegedly searched in Google Maps for the hotel where Victim C was staying.

The fourth victim, Victim D, was attacked at a different hotel in Schaumburg a short time after she’d reported Victim C’s assault to their boss, prosecutors said. In that incident, Uribe was “about to rape” Victim D when there was a knock at the door and he fled the hotel.

At a bond hearing last year, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Shih said Uribe’s DNA was found on hotel bedding after one of the alleged attacks. The FBI was also able to match toll plaza records and Google Maps searches to place Uribe at or near the hotels when the assaults occurred, Shih said.

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