Jeffrey Hurant, the former CEO of escort site Rentboy, was sentenced to prison in Brooklyn federal court yesterday after pleading guilty to promoting prostitution and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
Related: Rentboy’s former CEO Jeffrey Hurant sentenced to prison
District Judge Margo K. Brodie sentenced him to six months behind bars, plus a $7500 fine. At the sentencing, she characterized Rentboy as “the very thing that is illegal,” although she also recognized that “there is no question it did a lot of good.”
Related: Michael Lucas Reveals The Saddest News From The Takedown Of Rentboy
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Since the very beginning, many have said the case against Hurant was misguided, arguing that it unfairly targeted LGBTQ people and sex workers, and that it punished a person who made sex work safer. Now that he has been sentenced, their frustrations have only grown stronger.
Scroll down to see how folks have been responding to Hurant’s sentencing…
Rentboy CEO gets 6 jail time. Judge said although company was illegal, “there is no question it did a lot of good.” https://t.co/M5O0wCmAPI
— Duchess Gummybuns (@RyChavis) August 2, 2017
Jeffrey Hurant, former Rentboy CEO, was sentenced today. To me, this says all along the point was to shut down sex workers' ads. https://t.co/mXDkjlkgxb
— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) August 2, 2017
Anyone feel like yelling at each other in agreement through DMs about the incredible injustice of this? Rentboy helped so many and hurt none https://t.co/6rE82RqZPv
— Andrew (@xoandrew) August 2, 2017
a re-read: "we can’t afford to lose even one more tool that keeps us alive in this economy of violence" #rentboy https://t.co/izFxKgWB3O pic.twitter.com/Ti6bkswBrX
— SWARM ? (@SexWorkHive) August 3, 2017
Jeffrey Hurant build a site that made sex work safe and it landed him in prison https://t.co/gh8UcyKI8U via @Newsday
— Mathew Rodriguez (@mathewrodriguez) August 2, 2017
I haven't been involved in sex work for awhile now but I must say, Rentboy provided me a safe way to make money.
— Little Chaos (@ScrappyGaGgot) August 2, 2017
Rentboy's C.E.O. just sentenced – he should have taken the case all the way up to the Supreme Court. https://t.co/FMhVHPA7v2
— Tamara Ching (@ChingTamara) August 2, 2017
Criminalizing sex work and shutting down services like RentBoy make the LGBT community less safe. https://t.co/Tsl9CIvwGt
— Veronica Valenta (@VeronicaValenta) August 3, 2017
Decriminalize. Decriminalize. Decriminalize.#SexWork #Rentboy https://t.co/dLPeQYicA3
— Lambda Legal (@LambdaLegal) August 3, 2017
The harsh Rentboy sentence is another reminder of the excessive power of prosecutors, this time to punish LGBT people.
— Mike Chase (@mikechaseRights) August 2, 2017
Ex-CEO of LGBT escort site Rentboy sent to prison, despite judge saying site helped sex workers stay safe https://t.co/hmn8m2V5zv via @AP pic.twitter.com/wDdkbonRW0
— Trans Equality (@TransEquality) August 3, 2017
Actual prison time for Rentboy CEO? Even tho judge said site "did a lot of good"! #fuckprohibition #rightsnotrescue https://t.co/XiDH8l9u3m
— petdj ~ ??? (@djprosub) August 2, 2017
Paco
I’m not going to pretend that his intentions were altruistic. He made boatloads of money while breaking the law. I guess the money laundering charges came from his attempts to explain where his money was coming from.
Go ahead and legalize it, but tax the hell out of it to help fund healthcare.
Mandrake
Excellent idea to tax sex services and apply the money toward healthcare and HIV education.
adrianjurado310
he is the perfect face of rentboy.com. there are so many tricks out there and finally the one has been caught , put on the news, and charged. he is special, like my loneliness- they need to charge more because of this. I appreciate a good ho and this is just going to make them stress, get fat and ugly ending adult entertainment completely. Hookers out there don’t let rentboy.com make u less available or beautiful I am happy to support any ho keeps chubby chasers at the bars or honking on the street.
jsmu
No, Paco. He made lots of money while breaking an unjust, paternalistic, Puritanical, asininely moralistic ‘law,’ but he also helped many people and did absolutely no harm. I’m not going to pretend you’re intelligent, but you could try harder for basic cognitive adequacy.
Paco
@jsmu – If you don’t like a law, you work to get it removed. You don’t break it and expect no consequences for doing so simply because you disagree with it. If you find it so unjust then get up off of your lazy ass and change it. Legally.
If he wanted to profit from pimping and prostitution, then he should have worked on legalization before setting up an illegal operation in the U.S.
He got a slap on the wrist.
Rex Huskey
you break the law, you pay the fine, full stop!
Bob LaBlah
When you brag about your $400k Ferrari to people who are taking three trains and a bus to work/clients house knowing they are still going to do nothing more than make ends meet they are going to start talking. Sooner or later one of them are going to become vindictive and call the IRS, the cops…etc.
If you KNOW you aren’t quite right, shall we say, then keep you mouth shut. Its just that simple.
MediaManRedux
You want to tax dick and give the money to the government so they can wage still more wars and run the deficit even further into oblivion. Obama the ass-wipe spent 10 trillion himself. And, you think a couple of blowjobs are going to make up for that profligate idiot’s spending habits. Seriously?
Kangol
You pro-Trump right-wing fanatics are so hilarious. Obama pulled this country out of the ditch George W. Bush drove us into. The economy that Trump is sitting on, when he’s not off golfing or lying or bragging about his shaky win, is Obama’s. It’s hard for you to deal with it, but it’s the truth, so man up and grow a pair!
Me2
He still got off kind of easy. There are people serving far greater sentences for far less crimes. He should consider himself lucky!
STS
I guess I really don’t get the shock and awe that he going to prison, I don’t like speed limits, but they are the law and I follow them, there are many, many victim-less crimes out there, but they are still crimes and they still get punished, just because two people agree to do something doesn’t make it legal or right.
Just because this affects the gay community is no reason for us to whine about how sex work is all of a sudden a crime – sex work has just about always been a crime in the US, this is nothing new it’s not surprising, or even news worthy. He even admits that what he did was illegal. The biggest head scratcher here is why the powers that be waited so long to shut rentboy down.
The way to handle this is to either figure out where this is legal and run the service from there, or do the work needed to get the laws changed – not rocket science. Complaining and whining about how this shouldn’t be a crime isn’t going to change anything, most people in the US are okay with sex work being illegal and this is a democratic country (for better or for worse) so, make a good case that changes enough peoples minds and the laws will follow.
Brian
We’re gay, so we’re supposed to be exempt from laws like this, I guess. I’m so tired of the narrative that when things like this happen it’s targeting the LGBT community. When you’re a high profile pimp or madam, you’re a target, period. Heidi Fleiss got a much harder sentence then this guy did.
Whether prostitution should be legalized or not is certainly a valid discussion (I think it should be), but for now it ain’t, and nothing about this is worth all this faux outrage.