On Monday, a federal court in California sentenced Girls Do Porn performer Ruben Andre Garcia to 20 years in jail. Garcia had previously pled guilty to federal counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud, and coercion, as part of the ongoing federal case against the company.
In 2019, Girls Do Porn owners were found guilty of intimidating and coercing 22 women into having sex on camera. Garcia and the other producers bullied the women and lied about how widely they’d distribute the videos. Garcia was the male performer in the majority of the videos, though his face never appeared on camera.
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After telling the women that the videos would only be distributed abroad and to private collectors, they appeared on the Girls Do Porn website. The videos also reached millions of viewers after Girls Do Porn uploaded then to Pornhub and other porn tube sites, where women were often doxed in the comments. The doxing in turn led to the women being harassed at their jobs and schools. Multiple women said the harassment was so vicious, they’ve contemplated suicide.
Garcia’s sentencing took several hours to finish. More than 20 anonymous women gave impact testimony detailing how Garcia and Girls Do Porn had hurt them.
Girls Do Porn founders Michael Pratt, and associates Matthew Wolfe, Garcia, and Valerie Mosers were charged with federal counts of sex trafficking in November 2019. Pratt fled and is still at large. The FBI placed him on its Most Wanted List as is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to his arrest.
Garcia originally pled not guilty to all charges but changed his plea to guilty in 2020. The FBI published a full account of his plea, which detailed Garcia’s admissions. According to the admission, Garcia and his co-conspirators blocked doors with furniture when women tried to leave. They also “threatened to sue them, cancel their flights home, or post the footage that was already filmed online, which, unbeknownst to the victims, was going to happen anyway.”
