Federal prosecutors are urging a judge to impose a nearly 22-year prison sentence on Michael James Pratt, the founder of the now-defunct pornography website GirlsDoPorn, describing him as the “ringleader in a wide-ranging sex-trafficking conspiracy.”

Pratt, 42, pleaded guilty earlier this year to sex trafficking and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking, admitting to orchestrating a scheme that deceived and coerced dozens of young women into appearing in pornographic films under false pretenses.

He is scheduled to be sentenced on September 8 in U.S. District Court in San Diego before Judge Janis Sammartino.

From 2012 to 2019, Pratt and his associates lured women to San Diego with ads for modeling jobs, often posted on Craigslist. Victims were told the shoots would remain private, distributed only to overseas customers, and would not be posted online.

Instead, the videos were uploaded to GirlsDoPorn’s subscription site and redistributed on major porn platforms like Pornhub and YouPorn, generating millions of dollars in profits.

Prosecutors say the women were pressured into signing misleading contracts under company names like Bubblegum Casting and BLL Media, threatened with lawsuits, or told they would lose their return flights if they refused to perform. Some were supplied with alcohol or drugs.

When victims later pleaded to have their videos removed, Pratt and his team refused. In some cases, Pratt allegedly directed staff to contact the women’s friends, professors, or church members with links to the videos.

The harm continues for many women years later.

“A guilty plea is just words,” one victim said. “It doesn’t undo the damage or give back the years he’s stolen from so many lives—the innocence he ripped away.”

Another recalled answering what she thought was a bikini modeling ad:

“I was a young woman trying to chase my dreams. I answered the wrong email, and my life got turned upside down.”

Many victims described ongoing stigma. “I don’t start any new relationship or job without this coming up,” said one woman. “I’m afraid to post my name anywhere.”

In 2020, a San Diego civil court ordered GirlsDoPorn to pay $13 million in damages to 22 women who sued the company. Pratt fled during the proceedings, liquidating assets worth an estimated $17 million.

He spent more than three years as a fugitive, making the FBI’s Top Ten Most Wanted list before being arrested in Spain in late 2022 and extradited to the U.S. in 2024.

Several co-defendants have already been sentenced:

• Ruben Andre Garcia, lead performer, received 20 years.
• Matthew Isaac Wolfe, videographer and business partner, received 14 years.
• Alexander Brian Foster, who created a harassment video targeting victims at Pratt’s direction, received one year.

In a memorandum filed Friday, prosecutors asked Judge Sammartino to impose a sentence of 260 months (21 years, 8 months), citing Pratt’s leadership role and the lasting trauma inflicted on victims.

Defense attorneys have argued for a shorter term, acknowledging Pratt’s guilt but asking the court to cap the sentence at 22 years to avoid what they called “a de facto life sentence.”

The GirlsDoPorn case has become one of the most high-profile prosecutions in the adult industry, underscoring the vulnerability of young women to deceptive recruitment practices and the challenges of policing online exploitation.

Attorney Brian Holm, who represented dozens of women in the civil suit, said the outcome is overdue but imperfect:

“What these men did was horrific and traumatizing. No prison sentence will make the victims whole. But seeing the criminal justice system at work brings some measure of accountability.”