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Backpage.com CEO pleads guilty to human trafficking
Documents unsealed today by the Justice Department (PDF) reveal Backpage.com CEO Carl Ferrer pleaded guilty to federal conspiracy charges in Arizona on April 5th, a day before the site was seized and shut down. Additionally, attorneys general in California and Texas announced today that the site itself has entered a guilty plea to charges of human trafficking in Texas, while Ferrer pleaded guilty to conspiracy and three counts of money laundering in California. Several corporate entities tied to the site, including Backpage.com LLC, also entered guilty pleas to charges of money laundering. As a part of the deal that will see him serve a maximum of five years in prison, the prosecutors say Ferrer has surrendered the URLs of the site and its data to law enforcement, and that he will cooperate in the prosecution against others involved with the company -- namely co-founders and controlling shareholders Michael Lacey and James Larkin, who were indicted April 9th. The plea deal includes Ferrer's admission that a majority of the site's ads were for sex services, and that he conspired with others to launder proceeds from the ads after credit card companies and banks wouldn't do business with the site.
Backpage.com execs hit with pimping and money laundering charges
California Attorney General Kamala Harris has renewed the case against the co-founders of online classifieds site Backpage.com. Earlier this month, a judge in Sacramento County threw out pimping and sex trafficking charges against three of the site's executives, citing Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects online service providers from illegal activity committed by users of their site. On Friday, however, Harris announced her office is pursuing 13 new charges of pimping and conspiracy to commit pimping as well as 26 counts of money laundering against the site's execs.
