Jane Doe Nos. 1-14 et al. v. GirlsDoPorn.com et al.

Intentional misrepresentation, fraudulent concealment

San Diego County

Superior Court Judge Kevin A. Enright

$12.775 million

Plaintiffs' Lawyers: Sanford Heisler Sharp LLP, Edward D. Chapin, Cara W. Van Dorn; The O'Brien Law Firm APC, John J. O'Brien; Holm Law Group PC, Brian M. Holm

Defense Lawyers: Panakos Law APC, Aaron D. Sadock, Bonnie E. McKnight; Law Offices of Daniel A. Kaplan, Daniel A. Kaplan; Law Office of George D. Rikos, George D. Rikos

Twenty-two plaintiffs who were conned into filming videos for an amateur porn site won $12.7 million in a lawsuit against the website's creators and operators.

The lawsuit claimed defendants Michael J. Pratt, Ruben Garcia and Matthew Wolfe promised the plaintiffs they would not distribute the videos. Despite those agreements, the defendants published the material on their website, GirlsDoPorn.com.

Pratt is on the FBI's most-wanted list with a $10,000 reward for information about his whereabouts.

According to the plaintiffs' attorney, Edward D. Chapin, a partner at Sanford Heisler Sharp LLP, some of the women were contacted on social media by people saying that they had seen the videos.

"One of the women was suicidal and attempted suicide," Chapin said. "But she didn't know how to use her boyfriend's pistol and missed and shot a hole in the floor. It scared her and she put the pistol away. It's a horror story."

The three defendants had allegedly posted false advertisements for clothed modeling work in the U.S. and Canada before letting the women know that the job instead entailed adult-related work, for which they would be paid $5,000 per video.

Chapin said that when he took the case, he worried about the moral blame that would be put on the women for agreeing to have sex on camera. Therefore, Chapin waived a jury trial and relied on the judge grasping the concept of fraud more clearly than a jury would.

He explained that part of the work was helping the women through the emotional trauma to get them to testify. One of the women collapsed into Chapin's arms outside of the courthouse.

"We had strong evidence, strong evidence of fraud," Chapin said. "And the story of a case is always critical and we had a good story. And the law was on our side."

Chapin and his team included Associate Cara W. Van Dorn, John J. O'Brien of the O'Brien Law Firm APC and Brian M. Holm from the Holm Law Group PC. The team had to get a bankruptcy stay lifted on one of Pratt's companies before going to trial.

San Diego County Superior Court Judge Kevin A. Enright signed the order in January 2020. Jane Doe Nos. 1-22 v. GirlsDoPorn.com; Michael J. Pratt, Andre Garcia, Matthew Wolfe et al. 37-2016-00019027 (San Diego Co. Super. Ct, filed June 2, 2016).

Defense attorneys could not be reached for comment.

"I was the lead attorney, but believe me, I stood on the shoulders of these three people," Chapin said of the team that worked on the case.

-- Henrik Nilsson