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Kristof: Goldman Sachs Gets Out of Underage Sex-Trafficking Biz
Nicholas Kristof---the influential New York Times columnist who wrote a book, Half the Sky
, about global women's rights---hasn't let up on Village Voice Media, the company that owns both Seattle Weekly and Backpage.com, and is one of the largest culprits in online child sex trafficking in the United States.
On the heels of an enraged op/ed denouncing VVM for pretending it's unaware of child sex trafficking on Backpage (Kristof noted that attorneys general in 22 states have linked the site to arrests for the trafficking of underage girls), Kristof revealed today that Goldman Sachs, the international investment firm, has long held a large stake in VVM---16 percent, Kristof reported.
That's a relatively small stake---VVM's primary owners, Jim Larkin and Michael Lacey, apparently own about half the company---but the potential embarrassment of being associated with child rapists was enough to prompt Goldman Sachs to dump their shares of the company the second Kristof came calling. That doesn't absolve the firm of the fact that for six years, it invested in VVM---and, as Kristof points out, "there’s no indication that Goldman or anyone else ever used its ownership to urge Village Voice Media to drop escort ads or verify ages" during that time.
According to an earlier Kristof column, Backpage accounts for about 70 percent of all online prostitution ads in the US, and earns more than $22 million a year from online prostitution ads. In an unsigned piece denouncing Kristof, VVM claimed that the company, which has five Backpage web sites, employs "hundreds" of workers dedicated exclusively to making sure the prostitutes advertised on the sites are of age. Neither Seattle nor national VVM representatives responded to my requests that they substantiate that claim.
On the heels of an enraged op/ed denouncing VVM for pretending it's unaware of child sex trafficking on Backpage (Kristof noted that attorneys general in 22 states have linked the site to arrests for the trafficking of underage girls), Kristof revealed today that Goldman Sachs, the international investment firm, has long held a large stake in VVM---16 percent, Kristof reported.
That's a relatively small stake---VVM's primary owners, Jim Larkin and Michael Lacey, apparently own about half the company---but the potential embarrassment of being associated with child rapists was enough to prompt Goldman Sachs to dump their shares of the company the second Kristof came calling. That doesn't absolve the firm of the fact that for six years, it invested in VVM---and, as Kristof points out, "there’s no indication that Goldman or anyone else ever used its ownership to urge Village Voice Media to drop escort ads or verify ages" during that time.
According to an earlier Kristof column, Backpage accounts for about 70 percent of all online prostitution ads in the US, and earns more than $22 million a year from online prostitution ads. In an unsigned piece denouncing Kristof, VVM claimed that the company, which has five Backpage web sites, employs "hundreds" of workers dedicated exclusively to making sure the prostitutes advertised on the sites are of age. Neither Seattle nor national VVM representatives responded to my requests that they substantiate that claim.
