Girls Do Porn Founder Michael Pratt Arrested In Spain

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The owner of a pornographic site who federal authorities consider the “mastermind” behind a commercial sex trafficking ring was recently extradited from Spain to appear in court nearly five years after felony charges were filed against him in San Diego. The indictment against those involved in the conspiracy was unsealed in 2019 at the same time they were fighting a Superior Court lawsuit filed by 22 women. The judge in that case found in favor of the women and handed down a $12.7 million judgment against Pratt, Wolfe, adult performer Ruben Andre Garcia and various business interests connected to Pratt. Prosecutors have alleged that Pratt and those who worked for him recruited young women online as models, but when the women arrived in San Diego, they were pressured to have sex on camera. The women were told the videos would go to private DVD collections overseas, but instead they were widely disseminated on the GirlsDoPorn network of sites, as well as free pornography sites.

• A law enforcement source told BI last week that an announcement will be made soon.
• A look into the finances of GirlsDoPorn showed that they had once been owned by a parent company called GT Group Ltd., which was a corporation listed in the Panama Papers as a tax haven for several illicit organizations.
• Her third takedown request came in May 2017 “after MindGeek continued to publish her video on PornHub.com,” the complaint said.
• At just 22 years old, she was lured into traveling to California for what she thought was an above-board modeling job.

Victims Win Nearly $13 Million in Lawsuit Against GirlsDoPorn

The FBI is still searching for GirlsDoPorn creator Michael Pratt, who faces criminal sex-trafficking and child-porn charges. Charges were also filed against other GirlsDoPorn principals including Ruben Andre Garcia and Matthew Wolfe. The victims said they suffered relentless torment after online trolls figured out their names and posted that and other private information online. Some had links or images from the videos emailed to parents and grandparents, coworkers and bosses. Approximately 30 women told Wolfe and the judge, sometimes in great detail, about how Wolfe contributed to their lives being completely upended. Some women spoke during a hearing in January, while even more spoke in person and via video conference Tuesday.

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Michael Pratt, the main culprit of the trafficking scheme, fled the country and is a wanted fugitive. And Pornhub executives who are accused of distributing and profiting from the victims’ trauma have yet to face civil or criminal consequences. GirlsDoPorn’s victims were doxxed, harassed and humiliated, and they felt they had a full-time job they never asked for – trying to get the videos of their trafficking removed from the internet. At the time of the filing of this criminal complaint about one year ago (2019), authorities were still in the process of reaching out to the several hundreds of women affected by this scheme – as well as figuring out the various entities that money from this scheme had been funneled through. However, as this lawsuit continued to fall into place within the court system, it became apparent that the labyrinth of production companies and shell corporations established by Michael Pratt had become a minefield for his opponents’ lawyers. A look into the finances of GirlsDoPorn showed that they had once been owned by a parent company called GT Group Ltd., which was a corporation listed in the Panama Papers as a tax haven for several illicit organizations.

• Dozens of women were slapped and choked in the process of shooting their scene and would report vaginal bleeding afterward.
• What had originally been promised as 30-minutes would often turn into a several hour shoot, during which time the male performer – oftentimes Andre Garcia – treated the women roughly.
• Pornhub was hit with a $40 million lawsuit from sex-trafficking victims the day after it said it had started deleting millions of videos from its platform, Vice reported.

In response to the initial complaint against the company, Pratt denied the charges, saying through his attorney that the plaintiffs had “failed to exercise ordinary and reasonable care on their own behalf,” and thus had no right to claim damages. He also attempted to stall the trial by declaring bankruptcy in January, writing in a text message that “as soon as i bankrupt the business they [the plaintiffs] are fucked.” Last month, he fled the country and is officially considered a “fugitive” by the FBI. Four of Pratt’s co-defendants have pleaded guilty, with Matthew Isaac Wolfe facing 11 to 14 years in prison after admitting in July to filming about 100 videos over seven years while managing the websites’ finances and supporting businesses. Pratt fled the US in 2019 as a civil lawsuit against him and his business partners was underway in San Diego.

Rollins says that Evie said no and that her medical exam is consistent with rape, but she forgets to tell Benson that Daniel may have recorded the assault. Just as Benson is about to send Rollins to find the tape, Matt and Daniel’s lawyer, Buchanan, stops by the precinct and gives them a flash drive of the video Daniel recorded and a second flash drive that contains a dozen other adult videos starring Evie. In most cases, there are many different kinds of medications to treat the same condition.

There is no dispute Deyun Shi bludgeoned his teenage relatives in 2016, but his attorneys argue during his trial that he was suffering from mental illness. Prosecutors will argue Thursday, when Pratt is due back in court for a bail hearing, that he is both a flight risk and a danger to the community. “For a long time, I thought that I just made a stupid decision,” Mariah said Tuesday. “I did not realize that I was sex trafficked.” District Judge Janis Sammartino, who has sentenced all the other defendants in the GirlsDoPorn case other than website owner Michael James Pratt , whose case remains ongoing. Sonny and Rollins discover her on the set of a movie in New Hampshire where Evie refuses to go back to home or to school. There is nothing the detectives can do except watch as Evie takes quaaludes, washes it down, drops her robe, and steps on to the set where there are over ten naked men waiting for her.

Prior to the criminal prosecution, the website and its operators were sued by 22 women featured in its videos, and a San Diego judge awarded the women nearly $13 million at the end of a civil trial. On Tuesday, Pratt pleaded not guilty to charges including sex trafficking, production of child pornography and sex trafficking of a minor. Most of the video shoots took place in San Diego – at local hotels and short-term rental units.

“I’m going to kill myself if this stays up here. I was scammed and told this was only going to be on DVDs in another country. Please I’m begging you I’ll pay,” one plaintiff said in a 2016 message to Pornhub. This same victim said they sent two more messages and the video was not taken off MindGeek’s sites until after October 2019, the lawsuit added. It argued that it was an open secret in the porn industry that Girls Do Porn was scamming and coercing girls as soon as it started in 2009. In 2016, victims started to get in touch with Pornhub to have their videos removed, the suit said. The women filed the suit on Tuesday against MindGeek, Pornhub’s parent company, alleging that it hosted Girls Do Porn videos in the knowledge of the company’s illegal practices. Garcia’s sentencing is a groundbreaking moment in the fight against sex trafficking, but it’s not a sufficient end to the story.

But the video was never uploaded, for whatever reason – with the defendants finally realizing that their actions had severe consequences. While some of these young women varied in certain ways – having been told different things by different people at different times – the beats of their story unfolded in almost identical ways. Each time, they presented a series of fraudulent statements presented by the defendants, over a prolonged period of time, which had led to them accepting an offer to be filmed… And contrary to popular belief, contracts are not valid or binding when signed under fraudulent or misleading conditions.