MARTINEZ — A Pittsburg woman who cut up a human trafficking victim from head to toe, partially scalping her, was sentenced Thursday to 17 years in prison.

Rachel Elaine Smith received the sentence in exchange for accepting a plea deal on charges of mayhem, robbery, and possessing a stolen gun. With good behavior, she will be required to serve 85 percent of her sentence.

Smith’s sentence marks the beginning of the end to a sprawling human trafficking case that centered on Bay Point resident Deandre Lewis, convicted by a jury in January of torture, human trafficking, and a litany of other charges, while hanging 7-5 on a murder charge. One juror called the case “tragic” and said it opened her eyes to a world that hides in plain sight in the Bay Area.

“I’d never seen that side. It exists, but you don’t know the details of the lifestyle,” said Kimberly, the juror’s foreperson who declined to give her last name. “People do what they need to do to survive. It’s really tragic what (the girls) endured.”

Kimberly said that, though she is not as familiar with Walnut Creek and Concord, many of the jurors expressed surprise at the innocuous locations where many of the crimes occurred, and could no longer look at them the same way. She said the details of the case were hard to shake.

“I don’t think any of us jurors thought about anything else. So much came home with you — the testimony of the girls and Deandre — it’s tough to get out of your head,” she said. “It was a good first (jury) experience, but I’m OK if I don’t have to do it for several years.”

Prosecutors say Lewis ran a sex trafficking ring like a cult, managing sex workers’ finances, and setting up hidden cameras in bedrooms where they would go on “dates” with clients. He also enlisted the women in fraud schemes, such as convincing an elderly Concord man that he was dating a woman in her 20’s, but she was actually a sex worker. The woman eventually gained power of attorney over the man, and after she committed suicide, Lewis set the elderly man up with another woman and continued to spend the man’s money like nothing had changed.

Smith was Lewis’ “bottom girl,” or top prostitute, according to prosecutor Chad Mahalich, who said she was a single mother, working at an electronics store, when the two met. During the investigation, Smith was caught on a recorded jail call casually agreeing to stab and slice a woman who owed Lewis $1,800.

Later, she called him to confirm it was done, and complained that her hand was hurting. The two agreed that Lewis would tell the woman Smith had spared her life. Then she put the woman on the phone and Lewis told her she was “worser (sic) than dog (expletive),” and that she should be grateful to Smith for “granting you clemency.”

“It reminds me of David Koresh or Jim Jones. It’s that type of following and control to the point where you have a woman who used to work at Best Buy, now over a phone call torturing a woman who she was purportedly friends with,” Mahalich said. “To me, that is cult-like behavior.”

Lewis granted an exclusive jailhouse interview with this newspaper, where he said he was a sheet metal worker before getting into a “real bad motorcycle accident” and turning to illegal work. He testified during trial that he sold crack before getting into the sex trade, but adamantly denied that he forced women into prostitution.

“I’m not the greatest guy, don’t get it (expletive) up,” Lewis said. “But I never forced myself on anyone, I got too much game, I’m smooth… But at the end of the day, the easiest thing to say is, ‘He raped me.'”

Lewis also claimed that authorities were using radio waves to “ping” his brain and torture him, and send him audible messages, like “You’re a piece of (expletive).” Mahalich called it attention seeking behavior.

“I believe that about as much as I believe his testimony and the jury believed his testimony,” he said.

But Lewis’ attorney, William Welch, said he believed his client was having delusions because of the “horrific nature” of solitary confinement. Lewis has been housed at the Contra Costa County Jail’s administration segregation unit for years.

“I guess everyone’s entitled to their opinion,” Welch said, when told of Mahalich’s remarks. “I believe it’s bonafide and completely genuine and he was experiencing probably severe mental stress while he was detained in the jail.”

Lewis is scheduled to be sentenced in early May.