OAKLAND — In the span of a day, a 17-year-old girl went from video-chatting with a friend in the Central Valley to being trafficked by a convicted pimp in the Bay Area, according to local authorities.
Now, two people are facing serious charges over the alleged two-week ordeal. Devon Canada, 37, and Alajiah Nasrani Tisdale, 19, have been charged with human trafficking, pandering, pimping and threatening to harm or kill the girl if she attempted to escape them or hide money, according to court records. Canada also faces charges of sexually abusing the girl and possessing crack cocaine for sale.
Police say that it all started on Aug. 29, when the girl was in the Central Valley hanging out with a friend. Her friend got on a video call with Tisdale, who allegedly told the girl they could make thousands of dollars together in prostitution and arranged for her to take an Amtrak train to Oakland. The two met inside a train station bathroom in the East Bay, and the girl was introduced to Canada shortly thereafter, authorities allege in court filings.
“This is Daddy. We share him,” Tisdale allegedly told the girl, referring to Canada, records show.
From there, the pair allegedly taught the girl how to go on “dates” with men, to lie about her age and how to resist efforts by other pimps to take her away. They warned her that men in Oakland’s “Blade” — a slang term for an East Oakland neighborhood known for prostitution — would get violent, according to police. They refused to allow the girl to return to her family and threatened her with violence when she attempted to leave, or save up money so she could get a ride out of the area, according to authorities.
Finally, in mid-September, the duo “made (the girl) delete everything on her cell phone and blocked everything before she could leave back home,” police said in court filings. Authorities say they later identified Canada, who has a prior pimping conviction in Stockton, from his Instagram page, @Dirt_800. A detective was also able to find security footage from a hotel on MacArthur Boulevard showing the girl and both her alleged exploiters leaving a room, authorities said.
Canada was out on bail in a misdemeanor vandalism case at the time of the alleged offenses. That charge, though, stems from Canada allegedly running from an officer who spotted him “appearing to conceal a firearm” and damaging the roof of a home on the 8400 block of A Street in East Oakland as he attempted to make a getaway, authorities said in court filings.
When Canada was arrested in the trafficking case on Oct. 9, he had a “clear plastic sandwich bag containing fifteen smaller individual small plastic twists containing an off white powdery substance suspected cocaine base,” Oakland police said in court records.
Canada and Tisdale are both at Santa Rita Jail in Dublin, with bail set at $450,000 and $370,000, respectively. Canada has pleaded not guilty and is next due in court in November. Tisdale is set to enter a plea on Wednesday, records show.
Originally Published: October 21, 2025 at 11:20 AM PDT