Judge Gave Victim Gifts, Say Couple Convicted of Sex Trafficking

A federal judge’s impartiality is being questioned after she sent the victim in a sex-trafficking case a gift and a hand-written note moments before sentencing the defendants to 18 years in prison.

District Judge Margaret Guzman in Massachusetts had a law clerk or intern give the prosecuting attorney a gift for the victim — identified by the defense as the government’s key witness—during a break in the sentencing hearing for the two defendants, according to court filings.

Attorneys for the defendants learned about the gift five days after the sentencing in Worcester, when a prosecutor disclosed the judge’s present: a ...