22 Women Win $13 Million in Lawsuit Against Predatory Porn Company

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One of the allegations of the women against GirlsDoPorn is that the site’s proprietors deliberately leaked their real names in order to drum up interest in their videos. But publishing a video like this would have been a more brazen act of doxing. The video was supposed to end with the text “These retarded lawyers and disquisting [sic] whores wasted 3 years of everyones [sic] time. Ask yourself how viral these videos will go now if nobody is controlling them… Good job.” In August 2023, as part of the Pornhub network, Aylo launched UViU, a platform for creators to sell content directly to fans.[91] Designed with creator input, UViU helps diversify income and increase earnings. It offers tools for video sales, paid subscriptions, tips, and direct messages. Fans can discover and browse creators’ content, while creators can manage their Pornhub and UViU accounts from one dashboard.

• Michael Pratt, the owner of GirlsDoPorn, appeared in a federal court on Tuesday and pleaded not guilty to sex trafficking charges filed in the Southern District of California on Oct. 10, 2019, according to a Justice Department news release.
• The trial lasted over three months, beginning in August of 2019 and finally wrapping up that November.
• Michael Pratt was recently captured in Spain, while his victims, their attorneys, and federal prosecutors await his extradition to the U.S.
• Some it was found to have been transferred overseas, to bank accounts registered in the island nation of Vanuatu, while other cash had been converted into various cryptocurrencies.

Pornhub is awash in lawsuits by hundreds who say they never consented to the videos uploaded on the site

Get news and updates about your favorite shows, plus 3 free credits to watch locked content. As part of his agreement, prosecutors have recommended he receive no more than 12.5 years behind bars; however, they made a similar agreement in Garcia’s case and the judge ultimately opted to hand down a harsher sentence. The plaintiffs are 61 more unnamed “Jane Doe” victims of Girls Do Porn, adding to the 60 that sued Pornhub in 2020 for similar claims. The last person from the FBI’s San Diego office to make the 10 Most Wanted list was Ramon Eduardo Arellano-Félix in 1997. The 39-year-old New Zealand native is the first person in 25 years to make the list from the FBI’s San Diego field office.

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In total, the lawsuit is demanding more than $40 million in damages—at least $1 million per plaintiff—as well as the money MindGeek earned from hosting and promoting their videos and legal fees, Vice reports. “Personally, I’m happy they found him. But I’m even happier for all of his victims,” Brian Holm, attorney for the victims in the civil trial, said, according to VICE News. “Bringing Pratt to justice will bring the closure they need to heal. Christmas came a bit early this year.” Alex Riggins covers federal courts and federal law enforcement for The San Diego Union-Tribune.

• Jane Doe 7 ended up filming a porn video under duress in a hotel room where furniture blocked the door, preventing her from leaving.
• For many of the women ensnared by this scheme, the filming of the scene was the worst part.
• Your best bet is to browse some of the top cam sites before signing up for any subscriptions, premium memberships, etc.
• “But he was not mad or concerned. Instead he was excited and was eager to start.”

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Victims said they were plied with alcohol and cannabis before being rushed through signing a contract, which they were not allowed to read or obtain copies of. Some said they were sexually assaulted, held against their will or threatened if they asked to stop. The judge in that case found in favor of the 22 women who had sued Pratt and his GirlsDoPorn partners, handing down a $12.7 million civil judgment. Pratt joins a list that contains five murder suspects, a sixth man wanted in a murder-for-hire attempt, the alleged top leader of the MS-13 gang in Honduras and a Bulgarian woman suspected of running a $4 billion cryptocurrency fraud.

Late last year, Pornhub’s parent company agreed to pay more than $1.8 million to resolve a criminal probe alleging it profited from sex trafficking through its hosting of GirlsDoPorn videos. In October, prosecutors indicted former GirlsDoPorn employee Douglas “James” Wiederhold on five counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion, and one count of conspiracy to commit the same alleged crime. Though the indictment offers few details about his alleged conduct, related civil cases have revealed that Wiederhold created a GirlsDoPorn-style “mom” porn site for women over 30 years old. Finally, in March this year, the alleged GirlsDoPorn mastermind, Michael Pratt, was extradited from Spain to the US to face charges linked to the operation.

Pratt and his co-defendants allegedly paid other women to pose as “reference women” to falsely assure the victims that their videos would not be uploaded to the internet. Four of the website’s other employees have pleaded guilty to a variety of felonies. One of the defendants, porn actor and producer Ruben Andre Garcia, was sentenced to 20 years in prison, while videographer Theodore Gyi was sentenced to four years in prison. As soon as women had particular questions about where the porn videos were distributed, Garcia would take the conversations offline.