Tony Ortega

Tony Ortega Tony Ortega might have tried to sell Backpage to the public as a glorified dating site but the reality, as we’ve been seeing over the course of our investigation into the legal filings, was something far more nefarious. The plain, undeniable truth is that they were selling women and children to perverts online for profit. Backpage watchers had long been sounding alarm bells about the criminal implications of its business model, now some on Backpage payroll were beginning to speak out in corroboration.

Tony Ortega We’ve written a lot here on the blog about the article Tony Ortega published in the Village Voice attempting to smear New York Times writer Nicholas Kristof after his in-depth exposé the Backpage sex trafficking syndicate. Like many media watchers we don’t hold a very high opinion of Tony Ortega’s so-called ‘reporting’ and we hold an even lower opinion of his ethical standards. But sometimes the most damning indictments don’t come from outside observers, they come from your own readers.

It’s been a while since we last checked in with what is happening in the whirlpool of lawsuits and litigation surrounding the Backpage sex syndicate for which Tony Ortega acted as defacto public-facing apologist. For more than six years Tony Ortega paychecks were directly dependent upon how much ad space Backpage could sell to pimps looking to profit of sexually exploitable women, many of them underage. We here at the blog have long contended that Tony Ortega and the men at the top of this sex-for-cash scheme were fully aware of their actions.

More fall out today following the news we reported to you recently about the former Florida teacher who purchased a 14-year-old girl for sex via the now-seized website Backpage.com after it was announced that he would be sentenced to 10 years in prison. According to the Gainesville Sun, report on the story Jeffrey Farrell Davis, 36, who taught at Oak View Middle School in Alachua County from 2010 to 2015, was sentenced Monday after he pleaded guilty to a child sex trafficking charge in March 2018.