Hedge Funds Sued By Child Sexual Abuse Victim Serena Fleites For Funding Pornhub, According To Lawsuit

Porn has ruined the lives of both men and women.

Serena Fleites was only 13 years old when an explicit video of her appeared on PornHub.com in 2014. Her boyfriend had recorded and uploaded the child sexual abuse material without her consent.

Pornhub's parent company, MindGeek (otherwise now known as Aylo), reportedly distributed the child sexual abuse material through its various websites, earning ad revenue in the process. The pornography platforms used Visa for the website transactions between advertisers and MindGeek. In 2022, Fleites filed a lawsuit against MindGeek, further implicating Visa, alleging they conspired with the site to make money from the videos of her abuse.

In the latest suit filed on May 23, 2024, court documents allege hedge funds Colbeck Capital Management and Redwood Capital Management financially backed MindGeek despite being aware of the platform spreading child sexual abuse material. Visa is still implicated in facilitating the monetization of this content by processing payments. The plaintiff claims that MindGeek and the defendants knowingly profited from the exploitation and abuse of women, including trafficking and rape.

“This is a case about rape and trafficking, not pornography. And it is a case about each of these defendants knowingly and intentionally electing to capitalize and profit from the horrendous exploitation and abuse of tens of thousands of other human beings so they could make more than the enormous sums of money they would have otherwise made anyway,” the suit reads.

Key executives Bernard Bergmair, Feras Antoon, and David Tassillo allegedly built MindGeek's empire by accepting and spreading explicit child sexual abuse material. MindGeek reportedly helped users enhance the appeal of the explicit videos by suggesting titles, tags, and categories that would attract more viewers.

"These individuals built the MindGeek empire by knowingly and intentionally adopting an unrestricted content business model under which they would solicit and monetize all pornographic content without restriction, including child pornography and other nonconsensual content," the suit reads.

It continues, "In doing so, they did not merely provide a platform for others to post child pornography. They embraced the practice and proactively assisted such users in maximizing the attention their content received."

Serena Fleites is seeking compensation for the "substantial damages," according to the documents, "including but not limited to, physical, psychological, financial, and reputational harm as well as other damages."

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