CENTENNIAL, Colo. (CBS4) – A man convicted in a case of child sex trafficking has now been ordered to pay the state tens of thousands of dollars for the physical and mental health treatment of the victims.

It comes under a new law that allows prosecutors to ask those convicted of crimes to pay the state back for the treatment of the victims. It’s believed to be the first time it’s happened.

Alex Brown has been ordered to pay $72,000 for the state’s treatment of the girls he was convicted of trafficking.

“Did you know she was 13?” CBS4 Investigator Rick Sallinger had asked Brown in previous story.

“I had had no idea — nobody knew,” Brown replied.

The girls were offered in ads, but Brown maintained his innocence.

“Were you a pimp? Were you engaged in putting teenage girls into prostitution? Sallinger asked Brown.

“Under no circumstances was I involved with pimping. I am not a pimp,” he replied.

Brown pleaded guilty and was given 32 years to life. Then prosecutor Cara Morlan went back to court under the new law and got the judge to order restitution.

“If you traffick young girls the message to the pimps that are out there is that we will also hold you accountable financially for the damage that you have done,” Morlan said.

Brown claimed the two females turned on him.

“Are you saying these women are doing this to get out of being charged as a prostitute?” Sallinger said.

“They are doing this to avoid prostitution charges,” Brown said.

Arapahoe District Attorney George Brauchler says this may be the first case, but not the last.

“If you go out and commit a crime, you make victims, and you make victims have to spend money or make the state spend money to help make them whole again, you should have to pick up the tab for that, not taxpayers,” Brauchler said.

Brown will have to start paying from his prison account.

Brown didn’t bother to show up for the hearing in which he was ordered to pay.