Backpage.com was named in the lawsuit as well.
A Texas woman is suing Facebook for allegedly facilitating sex
trafficking on its platform. The woman, identified as Jane Doe, claims
that at the age of 16, she was friended by another Facebook user, with
whom she had friends in common, and he later beat, raped and forced her
into sex trafficking. He also allegedly posted photos of her on the now
defunct Backpage.com. The suit names Backpage.com and two hotel owners
as defendants as well.
The complaint says Facebook "has continually been used to facilitate
human trafficking by allowing sex traffickers an unrestricted platform
to stalk, exploit, recruit, groom, recruit and extort children into the
sex trade. Facebook is now the first point of contact between sex
traffickers and these children... Facebook not only provides an
unrestricted platform for these sex traffickers to target children, but
it also cloaks the traffickers with credibility."
Facebook is accused of negligence, gross negligence and of being in
violation of a 2009 Texas anti-trafficking law. The suit says the
trafficker used a false identity on the platform and that Facebook
didn't do enough to verify his identity, according to Reuters. The
lawsuit also argues, Gizmodo reports, that Facebook should have warned
its users that traffickers operate on the site.
Backpage.com is accused of assisting human traffickers in their attempts
to exploit minors and other victims while the two hotel owners in
question are said to have "turned a blind eye" to the trafficking that
occurred at their locations. The federal government shut down
Backpage.com earlier this year and the company later pleaded guilty to
human trafficking charges.
"It was not just because a pimp did something that Jane Doe was
trafficked," Doe's attorney Annie McAdams told the Associated Press.
"That pimp is not able to traffic Jane Doe unless Facebook allowed him
access to her." The lawsuit seeks at least $1 million in damages on
behalf of Doe.
We've reached out to Facebook for more information and we'll update this post if we hear more.
https://www.geezgo.com/sps/41552
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