Backpage CEO arrested for sex trafficking, offices raided
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DALLAS (AP) — State agents raided the Dallas headquarters of adult classified ad portal Backpage and arrested Chief Executive Officer Carl Ferrer on Thursday following allegations that adult and child sex-trafficking victims had been forced into prostitution through ? ads posted on the site.
Ferrer, 55, was arrested on a California warrant after arriving at Houston's Bush Intercontinental Airport on a flight from Amsterdam.
"Making money off the backs of innocent human beings by allowing them to be exploited for modern-day slavery is not acceptable in Texas," Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican, said in a statement.
California Attorney General Kamala Harris said that Ferrer was arrested on felony charges of pimping a minor, pimping, and conspiracy to commit pimping. He is being held in lieu of $500,000 bond and will face an extradition hearing before he can be returned to California.
"Raking in millions of dollars from the trafficking and exploitation of vulnerable victims is outrageous, despicable and illegal," said Harris, a Democrat who is running for the U.S. Senate in next month's election. "Backpage and its executives purposefully and unlawfully designed Backpage to be the world's top online brothel."
An attorney representing Backpage, Liz McDougall, did not immediately respond to telephone and email messages left by The Associated Press.
The site's controlling shareholders, Michael Lacey, 68, and James Larkin, 67, have been charged with conspiracy to commit pimping, Harris said in a statement. Neither of them has been taken into custody by late Thursday although warrants have been issued for their arrest. Under California's law, felony pimping is defined as making money off of prostitutes or soliciting customers for prostitution.
Lacey and Larkin are former owners of the Village Voice and the Phoenix New Times. An attorney who previously represented the two men, Michael Manning, did not immediately respond to a telephone message from The AP.
Backpage advertises a wide range of services, but the California arrest warrant alleges that internal business records obtained through a search warrant show that 99 percent its revenue came from its adult services section between January 2013 and March 2015. California officials said the site collects fees from users who use coded language and nearly nude photos to offer sex for money.
Worldwide revenue from sex ads topped $3.1 million in just one week last year, according to a court affidavit. It says Ferrer expanded Backpage's share of online sex marketing by creating affiliated sites including EvilEmpire.com and BigCity.com with related content.
The site operates in hundreds of cities worldwide, authorities said, including more than 30 in California. It collected $2.5 million per month just from California, or more than $51 million during the 29 months covered by the internal revenue reports.
Larkin and Lacey each received $10 million bonuses from the website in September 2014, according to the court filing. It says Backpage was created in 2004, but since 2014 has been owned by a Netherlands-based company that has Ferrer as its only named partner.
California authorities said the state's three-year investigation found many of the ads include victims of sex trafficking including children under the age of 18.
One of the advertisers, identified only as 15-year-old "E.S.," ''was forced into prostitution at the age of 13 by her ? ," according to an affidavit filed with the complaint. She used other online advertising services until they were shut down, the court filing says, when she turned to Backpage.
"I mean really, coming from someone my age, there is too much access, like it's too easy for people to get on it and post an ad," she told California Special Agent Brian Fichtner, according to his affidavit.
California officials said their investigation was prompted in part by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which reported 2,900 instances to California authorities since 2012 when suspected child sex trafficking occurred using Backpage.
The criminal complaint includes allegations that five minors, three of them including "E.S." under age 16, paid to post advertisements on Backpage.
The charges against Ferrer could bring him nearly 22 years in prison, while Larkin and Lacey face a maximum six years.
Backpage has been the subject of recent Senate hearings into its classified ads. Last month, the Supreme Court refused to block a Senate subpoena seeking information on how Backpage screens ads for possible sex trafficking.
U.S. Sens. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Claire McCaskill, D-Missouri, chairman and ranking member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, issued a statement hailing the criminal charges resulting from what they called "the scourge of online sex trafficking."
They put the site's estimated annual revenues at more than $150 million, calling it "a market leader in commercial sex advertising."
https://www.yahoo.com/news/backpage-com-raided-ceo-arrested-225411507.html
Ferrer, 55, was arrested on a California warrant after arriving at Houston's Bush Intercontinental Airport on a flight from Amsterdam.
"Making money off the backs of innocent human beings by allowing them to be exploited for modern-day slavery is not acceptable in Texas," Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican, said in a statement.
California Attorney General Kamala Harris said that Ferrer was arrested on felony charges of pimping a minor, pimping, and conspiracy to commit pimping. He is being held in lieu of $500,000 bond and will face an extradition hearing before he can be returned to California.
"Raking in millions of dollars from the trafficking and exploitation of vulnerable victims is outrageous, despicable and illegal," said Harris, a Democrat who is running for the U.S. Senate in next month's election. "Backpage and its executives purposefully and unlawfully designed Backpage to be the world's top online brothel."
An attorney representing Backpage, Liz McDougall, did not immediately respond to telephone and email messages left by The Associated Press.
The site's controlling shareholders, Michael Lacey, 68, and James Larkin, 67, have been charged with conspiracy to commit pimping, Harris said in a statement. Neither of them has been taken into custody by late Thursday although warrants have been issued for their arrest. Under California's law, felony pimping is defined as making money off of prostitutes or soliciting customers for prostitution.
Lacey and Larkin are former owners of the Village Voice and the Phoenix New Times. An attorney who previously represented the two men, Michael Manning, did not immediately respond to a telephone message from The AP.
Backpage advertises a wide range of services, but the California arrest warrant alleges that internal business records obtained through a search warrant show that 99 percent its revenue came from its adult services section between January 2013 and March 2015. California officials said the site collects fees from users who use coded language and nearly nude photos to offer sex for money.
Worldwide revenue from sex ads topped $3.1 million in just one week last year, according to a court affidavit. It says Ferrer expanded Backpage's share of online sex marketing by creating affiliated sites including EvilEmpire.com and BigCity.com with related content.
The site operates in hundreds of cities worldwide, authorities said, including more than 30 in California. It collected $2.5 million per month just from California, or more than $51 million during the 29 months covered by the internal revenue reports.
Larkin and Lacey each received $10 million bonuses from the website in September 2014, according to the court filing. It says Backpage was created in 2004, but since 2014 has been owned by a Netherlands-based company that has Ferrer as its only named partner.
California authorities said the state's three-year investigation found many of the ads include victims of sex trafficking including children under the age of 18.
One of the advertisers, identified only as 15-year-old "E.S.," ''was forced into prostitution at the age of 13 by her ? ," according to an affidavit filed with the complaint. She used other online advertising services until they were shut down, the court filing says, when she turned to Backpage.
"I mean really, coming from someone my age, there is too much access, like it's too easy for people to get on it and post an ad," she told California Special Agent Brian Fichtner, according to his affidavit.
California officials said their investigation was prompted in part by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which reported 2,900 instances to California authorities since 2012 when suspected child sex trafficking occurred using Backpage.
The criminal complaint includes allegations that five minors, three of them including "E.S." under age 16, paid to post advertisements on Backpage.
The charges against Ferrer could bring him nearly 22 years in prison, while Larkin and Lacey face a maximum six years.
Backpage has been the subject of recent Senate hearings into its classified ads. Last month, the Supreme Court refused to block a Senate subpoena seeking information on how Backpage screens ads for possible sex trafficking.
U.S. Sens. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Claire McCaskill, D-Missouri, chairman and ranking member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, issued a statement hailing the criminal charges resulting from what they called "the scourge of online sex trafficking."
They put the site's estimated annual revenues at more than $150 million, calling it "a market leader in commercial sex advertising."
https://www.yahoo.com/news/backpage-com-raided-ceo-arrested-225411507.html
Comments
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? in the PPM right now like
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Damn what will become of the site?!?
Curious minds wants to know is all.. -
He about get that Texas justice. Damn. ? around and get the death penalty
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It's ? . If he doesn't have knowledge of the goings on he shouldn't be charged. They not locking up doctors for people abusing prescription pills
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Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely! He got in that seat / position specifically for this purpose. Believe that! Natural predators they are! CAC just got caught that's all. How many victims r there? He'll walk. He's White. Cops probably asked if he had pics or videos of the hoes they could look at and would work to get him a fair shake. Weird muhfuckas they r man.
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100% horseshit.
The government should not be interfering with two or more adults entering into a contractual agreement to exchange money or other consideration for sexual services. I see no compelling interest by the government, or society at large, to limit such behavior by consenting adults.
The point of engaging the services of an adult prostitute is to have sex without putting forward the effort to develop a romantic relationship, which is functionally no different than club-hopping, etc., looking for a one night stand. So from my viewpoint I see two scenarios:
Scenario 1: A guy goes to a club or other entertainment venue looking for a woman who piques his interest. He engages her in conversation and buys her food, drink, or whatever, while attempting to charm her enough that she will ? him.
Scenario 2: The same guy engages the services of a prostitute and takes the same money he would have spent wining, dining, whatever, a non-prostitute while seeking a one night stand, and instead gives her the money directly. He then needs to expend no effort charming her.....Remember, we pay for it on the front end, or pay for it (more) on the back end.
The end result in both scenarios is the same: the guy spends money for sex with no intention of starting a relationship with the woman. Why should one scenario be legal and the other illegal?
This arrest is really about mobilizing "outraged" women in an election year. *Note* Same time misogynistic musings of Trump are leaked to the media.
The prohibition of prostitution in a democratic country is fundamentally about women as a class using the electoral system to limit the sexual options of males for the benefit of women. That's what this issue is about--that's the underlying reason Backpage is being targeted.
Female voters (all the aging house wives, all the plain and overweight women etc, and the rest even) have the interest of keeping the price of sex as expensive as possible for males in general so that female willingness to engage in sex is more valuable and gives women more power within relationships. Is a 39 year old wife really comfortable with the idea of her husband having the option of getting laid by 21 year old curvy prostitute?
I. Think. Not. -
@ the dukester....This World ain't nothing but a $. I just do me and stopped giving a ? about society eon's ago. Such a liberating feel too. Lifts a loaf off ya shoulders and let's you see how they create and perpetuate the fuckery. Laugh at it and do you.
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theyre going to have a hard time actually convicting anybody
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@ the dukester....This World ain't nothing but a $. I just do me and stopped giving a ? about society eon's ago. Such a liberating feel too. Lifts a loaf off ya shoulders and let's you see how they create and perpetuate the fuckery. Laugh at it and do you.
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@ the dukester....This World ain't nothing but a $. I just do me and stopped giving a ? about society eon's ago. Such a liberating feel too. Lifts a loaf off ya shoulders and let's you see how they create and perpetuate the fuckery. Laugh at it and do you.
I feel you champ.
Information is the proverbial gift & curse.
I gotta find a way to decompress, and not give a ? about the chaos of the world. -
not_osirus_jenkins wrote: »It's ? . If he doesn't have knowledge of the goings on he shouldn't be charged. They not locking up doctors for people abusing prescription pills
How does he not have knowledge of
What is on Backpage but somehow we all know what kind of ads are posted on it
????
And they do lock up doctors and pharmacists for running pill mills .....
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He about get that Texas justice. Damn. ? around and get the death penalty
Only if he murdered someone ....
