(Originally published here for Planet Ivy)
And he’s really not happy about it.
Self-styled ‘entrepreneur’ Joe Francis founded the website ‘Girls Gone Wild’ back in 1997 and, through filming drunk and naked college girls at various parties and posting those videos online, the website has since made Francis a wealthy man with celebritynetworth.com putting his net worth at the $50 million mark.
Recently however, private videos of a rather naughty nature featuring Francis and his girlfriend, Abbey Wilson, found their way into the wrong hands (or the right hands, depending on your point of view) and it’s safe to say that the porn mogul and his legal team are decidedly unhappy about it.
The videos were stored on Abbey Wilson’s iPad and when that iPad was stolen earlier this year rumours began to float around of the videos being offered around to various websites. After all who wouldn’t want to publish compromising videos of a man who has made a career from taking advantage of drunken young college girls?
Francis’ lawyer, David Houston, seems to have other ideas. Talking to celebrity gossip site TMZ, he addressed the thief directly, threatening that “When we catch you, we will see that you are prosecuted to the fullest extent of both the criminal and civil laws.”
It’s hard not to take a little satisfaction from the idea of the camera being turned on the voyeur and watching him squirm under the sweaty red limelight for a change and with a questionable history of previous accusations this writer at least can’t help but wonder whether or not he had it coming.
Numerous times in the last decade the Girls Gone Wild has found itself in the dock for allegedly filming girls without consent and in 2003 the site was charged with filming girls who were allegedly under aged.
More recently in 2011 Francis took three women back to his home for a late night ‘party’ which resulted, for him, in three charges of false imprisonment, one of assault and a further charge of dissuading a witness. May of this year saw him convicted for these charges and he faces a possible five-year prison term and/or a $13,000 fine.
In an interview given after the sentencing, he was quoted as saying that the jury were “mentally retarded” and that they “should be euthanized.”
Now here at Planet Ivy, we could never openly condone theft. But we also can’t condone the surreptitious filming of drunken young girls for profit, now can we deny a certain satisfaction in seeing such delicious and righteous karma at work.
Image: Girls Gone Wild
Jay M F Hurst 