Choose a Girl

He departed the United States in the early weeks of the trial and his exact location isn’t known. The judge concluded that this was a calculated attempt to prevent the women from recovering damages in the case. The trial began last August and dragged on until November—largely because it took that long for the court to hear about the experiences of each of the 22 women. Lawyers for the women say they’ve talked to many others who had similar experiences. However, the others were unwilling to face the risk of retaliation from the defendants or the humiliation of publicly re-living their experiences.

Senior Labour MP Launches Attack on All Porn, Sex Work

• Police were able to identify Bailey, and a forensic review of his electronic devices found about 200 images and 20 videos of child pornography.
• « The women are mostly students with careers ahead of them who have only even considered Defendants’ solicitations to film a pornographic video due to some immediate and pressing financial need. »
• GirlsDoPorn video clips remain readily available from other pornographic video sites.
• She said internet trolls still harass her, including re-posting photos of her children that family members have published online.
• Multiple women said the harassment was so vicious that they contemplated suicide.
• The operators of GirlsDoPorn are in legal trouble because dozens of women say they were tricked and coerced into appearing in videos on the site.

Participants must also get copies of the contracts before arriving, and sign off on their names or personal information being used, Enright ruled. He ordered Girls Do Porn’s founder, Michael James Pratt, 36, his business partner, Matthew Isaac Wolfe, 37, and porn actor Ruben Andre Garcia, 31, to hand over all images, videos, likenesses, and copyrights and to take « active steps » to remove them from circulation. The decision comes about four years after the women first took action against the San Diego–based adult film site, which creates and advertises videos featuring young « amateur » teens and college students who are usually about 18 to 20 years old.

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More than a hundred women have also filed lawsuits against Aylo in San Diego, in which they allege the company knowingly hosted GirlsDoPorn’s videos even as the site came under scrutiny. This doesn’t mean GirlsDoPorn content has disappeared from the Web, however. GirlsDoPorn video clips remain readily available from other pornographic video sites. The women were told the videos wouldn’t be made public but would go to private DVD collections overseas, they testified. Instead, the videos were widely disseminated on the GirlsDoPorn network of sites and beyond.

In October of last year, the Daily Beast reported on a motion in which their attorney claimed to have interviewed 100 women with similar stories of fraud and coercion by GirlsDoPorn, and over a dozen accused actor Andre Garcia of sexual assault. Even still, porn consumers all over the internet who had the videos downloaded have continually uploaded and re-uploaded these GirlsDoPorn images and videos to multiple different porn sites over the last few years, even after the decision was handed down in January 2020. 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.

The suit claims that the women were coerced into performing in x-rated scenes before being paid less than agreed. « Defendants take considerable, calculated steps to falsely assure prospective models that their videos will never be posted online, come to light in the United States, or be seen by anyone who might know them, » Enright wrote. The women behind the lawsuit, however, claimed that while they did accept money for appearing in a porn film, they were led to believe their videos would not be made available on streaming services and marketed. The victims whose videos repeatedly were posted to the site said they have « suffered damages including but not limited to, sever emotional distress, significant trauma, attempted suicide, and social and familial ostracisation. » Some people abused the feature to post revenge porn and stolen images and videos of people who did not intend for their images to be out in the public. Even if Pornhub responded to complaints and removed the videos, the way the site operated simply allowed the harassers to post the stolen images all over again.

They sued a total of 13 affiliated businesses and individuals, including owner Michael Pratt, actor Andre Garcia, and videographer Matthew Wolfe. Michael James Pratt, who fled the United States during a San Diego civil trial and was subsequently charged criminally, made his initial appearance in a San Diego federal courtroom Tuesday afternoon. A not guilty plea was entered on Pratt’s behalf to a 19-count indictment that includes charges of sex trafficking, production of child pornography, sex trafficking of a minor, and conspiracy to launder monetary instruments. A hearing has been set for Thursday to discuss whether the 41-year-old should be released on bail. In July 2015, Jane Doe 1 responded to a Craigslist ad seeking models in the Las Vegas area.

“You better be here by noon shoot 2tomorrow or your graveyard,” one text included in the lawsuit read. Girls Do Porn was set up in 2006 by Mr Pratt, from New Zealand, which specialised in producing pornography of only younger women between 18 and 22. Despite agreements to the contrary, Jane Doe 15 claims the videos were quickly circulated online and her entire friendship group and many college peers became aware. The agreement was five sexual positions, each for around seven minutes and that it would be filmed in a San Diego hotel, with return flights to the city covered by them. Jane Doe 15 said her video was circulated widely online – despite contractual promises that the recordings was to be distributed on DVD abroad only. According to Moser, the models asked for their videos to be removed and even offered their earnings in exchange.

Also in October 2015, Jane Doe 17 said she was tagged in an Instagram post advertising the pornographic video she had filmed after responding to a Craigslist ad, which she thought no one would ever see. The post on the Girls Do Porn account included a photo of her on a hotel bed captioned “Coming soon.” The next day, she filed a report at the San Diego Police Department. She felt as though she hadn’t truly consented to being filmed because she was deceived about where the video would be released.

Initially Wolfe worked in the office maintaining the computer servers, handling payroll and taking care of other routine office tasks, but he eventually began filming videos and taking a more hands-on role within the company. The plaintiffs said they endured harassment and ostracizing as the result of their videos being shared online, and all of them had suicidal thoughts as a result. « 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. Garcia told Doe 10 that she’d be paid $5,000 to shoot an hour’s worth of hardcore, which would be a single scene featuring five sex positions, and which was to be shot at an upscale San Diego hotel where she would be set up with a room for the night. He also said that the footage would not be seen in the U.S., and that in this case, it would be sold privately to an « Australian collector. »