A Sioux Falls doctor accused of buying sex from underage girls through a Tea-based sex-trafficking ring will be on house arrest until his trial.
Joshua Payer, 35, is a former emergency-room doctor and Webster native. He is the only customer charged thus far in the case of Brandon Quincy Thompson, 27, a Chicago native accused of running an online prostitution ring from his home in Tea.
Payer is charged with sex trafficking of a child, aiding and abetting sex trafficking of a child, conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance and distribution of a controlled substance. He has been in jail since his Aug. 5 arrest. A trial date has not been set.
Payer will be required to wear an electronic monitoring device, check in twice a day with probation officers in Sioux Falls, turn over his passport and cease to practice medicine until the case is resolved.
Prosecutors had called Payer a flight risk, and on Wednesday a jailer from Yankton showed a letter Payer sent to his wife this month that appeared to have a map of Mexico with marked locations.
Defense lawyer Mike Butler said Payer never fled the city despite knowing for months that he was under investigation. Payer also voluntarily suspended his medical license in South Dakota, Iowa and Minnesota and gave up his passport.
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