Backpage Founders Speak Out As Another Exec Enters Guilty Plea (AVN)
Read the full article by Michael French at avn.com
Michael Lacey, the 69-year-old co-founder of Backpage.com, says that he believes federal prosecutors intend to put him and his business partner, Backpage co-founder James Larkin, 68, “in prison for the rest of our lives.” Lacey made the comments in a new interview published Tuesday by the libertarian site Reason.com, and marks the first time that Lacey and Larkin have discussed the case publicly since the federal government shut down the site in April.
But on Friday, the Backpage sales and marketing director, Dan Hyer, entered a guilty plea on charges of conspiracy to facilitate prostitution, according to a report by The Associated Press. Hyer admitted that he took part in a scheme to induce prostitutes to advertise on Backpage, rather than on competing sites, by offering them ads for free.
The site could afford to give away ads for free in a plan to corner the market on prostitution advertising because Backpage raked in upwards of $500 million in ads for illegal sexual services over the past 14 years, according to prosecutors.
