Author: Maggy Krell
Started: May 24, 2021
Finished: May 26, 2021
Thanks to NetGalley and NYUPress for the chance to read this book in exchange for an honest review.
Backpage was an advertisement website that sex traffickers used to promote the commercial sex trade. These ads promoted not only adult sex trafficking victims but children also. Maggy Krell was a prosecutor in California who was tired of putting victimized women in jail. Krell did everything she could to bring the owners of Backpage to just for profiting from prostitution. Although Krell had to jump through many hoops, she was eventually able to get the owners convicted of money laundering. The federal government then took the owners to federal court and seized the website in 2018.
This was a very quick read (only 192 pages) but detailed enough that you understood why Maggy Krell took the stance she did and how she managed to strike a blow against a company that profited off of the trafficking of women and children. Hers was the first of many lawsuits the site faced, including one from the federal government which led to the seizure of the website which can still be seen if you go looking for the site.