Filed under disappointed by not surprised: a federal judge has refused to dismiss a 100-count indictment against the creators of Backpage.com on Thursday, finding that the indictment “goes through a long and fact-specific description of the defendants participation in a conspiracy to facilitate and promote prostitution,”
This means that the allegations in the indictment are legally sufficient to withstand a Motion to Dismiss — not that they are necessarily enough to merit a conviction.
Michael Lacey, James Larkin and five employees of the site were originally scheduled for trial on Jan. 15, 2020 in a Phoenix, Arizona federal court. Attorneys were granted enough time to review an estimated 7 to 9 million pages of documents about the case.
The indictment accuses the site, its executives and employees of ignoring warnings to stop running advertisements promoting prostitution because the lucrative enterprise brought in half a billion dollars in sex work-related revenues since its inception in 2004.
Carl Ferrer, chief executive of Backpage.com, which was seized by the federal government in early April, has already pleaded guilty to charges in California and Texas. Under the terms of his plea deal, Ferrer agreed to turn state’s evidence against the company.
Ferrer also admitted that he and other Backpage executives had used “shell bank accounts and cryptocurrency processing companies” to conceal the source of their revenue.
Read the Order from judge Susan Brnovich in the US District Court in Arizona below.
