The plea comes shortly after a new federal anti-trafficking law was passed.
California is ahead of the curve when it comes to cracking down on websites that facilitate prostitution — at least when it comes to Backpage.com. The state first filed charges against the site’s owners in 2016. When the judge threw out the charges, California was persistent, refiling the charges — one of which is what CEO Carl Ferrer pled guilty to in April 2018.
Backpage.com was notorious for hosting thinly veiled ads for prostitution on its site since 2004. It launched in response to Craigslist, and was founded by the owners of a media group that produced alt weekly newspapers across the country. In addition to hosting ads for prostitution, Backpage was also accused of hosting child sex trafficking ads on its site. California has been particularly aggressive in going after Backpage for its offenses.
Recently, Ferrer pled guilty to multiple state and federal charges related to facilitating prostitution and money laundering. In his statement, he admitted to allowing prostitution to occur through Backpage, in violation of state law. He also acknowledged that Backpage had a process to remove photos and words that would openly suggest prostitution in order to avoid detection by the authorities, and so that Backpage could deny that the ads were for prostitution. Finally, Ferrer copped to money laundering. When credit card companies and banks refused to process payments for Backpage ads, the company would shift money through various accounts to collect the profits — which he admitted was money laundering. Ferrer also admitted that Backpage was complicit in the trafficking of a teenage girl.
Ferrer pled guilty to federal charges, and then was taken to Arizona, Texas and California, where he pled to a number of state charges. In California, he pled to money laundering after the pimping/facilitating prostitution charges were dropped by the court. Under the terms of his California plea agreement, prosecutors agreed to seek no more than 5 years in prison, to be served concurrently with his Arizona term. He also agreed to take down every Backpage website that he could within 5 days, and to forfeit all domains related to Backpage within 14 days.
The plea agreement came just before President Trump signed the Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act, or FOSTA. This bill removes protection for websites that host prostitution ads. It also allows victims and state attorneys general to file lawsuits against sites that host these types of ads.
Under California law, pimping is defined as knowingly receiving financial support from the earnings of someone engaged in prostitution. It is a felony offense. While the “pimping” offense was ultimately dropped from Ferrer’s indictment, under FOSTA, other websites that host these types of ads might not have the same type of protection, according to a criminal defense lawyer Riverside, CA.
At the Chambers Law Firm, our skilled criminal defense lawyer Riverside, CA represents clients who have been charged with any number of crimes, including ones related to prostitution. Contact us today at 714-760-4088 or dchambers@clfca.com to schedule a free initial consultation.
