Three Americans and a Honduran were ordered detained on Thursday in a sex trafficking case that shocked the country, following the disappearance of a university student in 2022 while jet-skiing in a popular tourist area.

"The judge has issued a formal indictment and the precautionary measure of preventive detention for (US citizens) Harold Joseph Green and William James Murdock," spokeswoman Barbara Castillo of the court in Tegucigalpa told reporters.

The hearing also ordered the prosecution and preventive imprisonment of Gary Lee Johnston and Ramon Trejo for "association to commit a crime," she added.

All four were allegedly involved in the trafficking of a young woman, she said, and face a preliminary hearing on May 8.

Green, Murdock and Trejo were captured last week in Roatan in the Bay Islands of the Honduran Caribbean, and Lee had been detained since August 2022, accused of belonging to a child pornography gang.

A 22-year-old Honduran university student disappeared on January 1, 2022 after going out to sea aboard a jet ski.

Initially police claimed she had drowned, but family members demanded an investigation because they suspected she had been abducted.

The young woman's jet ski, life jacket and other belongings were found days later on a cay.

Deputy Security Minister Julissa Villanueva said last week that authorities have information on "who has her and what happened around her abduction."

The victim has not yet been found.

The three Americans live in Honduras and have tourist investments in Roatan.