Last week the FBI announced that they have raised the reward for information leading to the arrest of fugitive Michael J. Pratt, owner of GirlsDoPorn.com, who along with his co-conspirators used the internet to recruit young women for modeling jobs.

The women who responded were later told the jobs were for sexually explicit videos. Investigators say the women were promised that the videos would not be posted online and that they would remain anonymous. In exchange, they would receive $3,000 to $5,000. However, the videos were indeed posted online, and Pratt’s pornography websites made millions of dollars in revenue from them.

The charges against Pratt include the production of child pornography and sex trafficking by force, fraud, and coercion. Pratt’s co-conspirators have all been arrested or have appeared in court. Among those charged were the websites’ cameraman and bookkeeper, who each pleaded guilty to trafficking charges earlier this year. Pratt’s alleged co-owner,

Matthew Isaac Wolfe, is awaiting trial in San Diego. In June, one of the websites’ lead recruiters and producers, Ruben Garcia, of San Diego, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for his role in the trafficking conspiracy.

Michael J. Pratt is a New Zealand native and thought to currently be somewhere in that country.

The FBI recently raised the reward to $50,000 in hopes that someone will come forward with tips and information to help advance the case.

A week after the owners and employees of Girls Do Porn were charged with federal sex trafficking and other related crimes, Pornhub removed all content from their popular website.

To the victims, this wasn’t done fast enough so, in December of 2020, 40 of the Girls Do Porn victims filed a lawsuit against Mindgeek, the parent company of Pornhub.com. The lawsuit included a litany of accusations including knowingly benefiting from Girls Do Porn videos on Pornhub and failing to moderate the images circulating rampantly on its network of tube sites. The lawsuit was later expanded to include 50 plaintiffs.

The lawsuit demanded 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.

Filed by the same attorneys who represented the women in a civil lawsuit against Girls Do Porn, the 43-page complaint details the suffering of these victims of Girls Do Porn and claims that each of the plaintiffs became suicidal because of the harassment they endured when their videos spread non-consensually across the internet, including across Mindgeek’s network of porn sites.

It appears now that the parties reached a mutual resolution to resolve the dispute and the terms are confidential.

I reached out to my friend over at Mindgeek who told me that don’t comment on legal matters. They won’t even confirm nor deny if a settlement has been reached.

However, Brian Holm, the lawyer for the victims did make the confirmation and appears to be happy with the resolution.

This Girls Do Porn legal battle, has played a large part in the new Visa and Mastercard regulations forced upon all adult merchants, that went into effect on October 15, 2021.