Attorneys general from 45 states — including Maryland and Virginia — are asking an online classified ad site to explain how it handles advertisements that the lawyers say facilitate prostitution and sex trafficking.
The attorneys general wrote in a letter to Backpage.com on Wednesday that the site’s purported efforts to curb such advertisements “have proven ineffective.”
The site said last fall that it was supending some areas of its personals and adult advertising sections. But the attorneys’ letter argues that Backpage is still a “hub” for prostitution and sex-trafficking.
“The prominence of illegal content on Backpage.com conflicts with the company’s representations about its content policies,” the letter reads. The letter asks the site to explain its criteria for determining whether an ad involves illegal activity, how it screens adds and how many ads have been reviewed and rejected.
Maryland Attorney General Douglas Gansler and Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli both signed the letter.
The attorneys say they have found more than 50 cases in 22 states in which charges were filed against people trafficking minors on Backpage, or attempting to do so.
Some of those cases have occurred in the D.C. region. A Wheaton mall security guard was accused of pimping teenage girls by creating ads for his escort business on Backpage and other sites. And three people charged in a Maryland sex trafficking case were accused of posting explict pictures of a teen girl on the site and pimping her for sex.
