Founder of Backpage.com has to go to prison

Michael Lacey, founder of the lucrative classifieds website Backpage.com, was sentenced Wednesday to five years in prison and fined $3 million on a single count of money laundering. He was accused of deriving funds from prostitution in a sprawling fraud case in which he is accused of profiting from prostitution. A jury convicted Lacey, 76, last year of international money laundering but failed to reach a consensus on 84 other counts of promoting prostitution and money laundering. U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa later acquitted Lacey of dozens of charges due to insufficient evidence, the AP reported, but he still faces about 30 counts of promoting prostitution and money laundering.

Authorities say the website generated $500 million in revenue from prostitution from its founding in 2004 until the government shut it down in 2018. Lacey's lawyers say their client was focused on running an alternative newspaper chain and was not involved in Backpage's day-to-day operations. But Humetewa told Lacey during sentencing that he was aware of the allegations against Backpage and did nothing. “In the face of all of that, you have stood firm,” Humetewa said. “You did nothing.” Two other Backpage executives, CFO John Brunst and Executive Vice President Scott Spear, were also convicted last year and each sentenced to 10 years in prison on Wednesday.

The judge ordered Lacey and the two executives to report to the U.S. Marshals Service in two weeks to begin serving their sentences. Prosecutors said the three defendants were motivated by greed, promoted prostitution while posing as a legitimate, secretive business, and misled anti-trafficking organizations and law enforcement about the true nature of Backpage's business model. Yvonne Ambrose, whose 16-year-old daughter, Desiree Robinson, was trafficked through Backpage in Chicago and killed in 2016 by a man who responded to an online sex ad, told the judge Tuesday about the pain she feels over her daughter's death. “I suffer every day from the loss of my baby,” Ambrose said.

(More stories from Backpage.com.)