San Diego's porn studios | San Diego Reader
The Hard Rock Hotel in San Diego's Gaslamp Quarter wants to make you feel like a star. Adhered to the wall behind the front desk is a colorful photo looking out at a raucous crowd from the stage at a rock concert.
See just how young 18 is.
Image by Andy Boyd
A few blocks north up Fifth Avenue, guests at the boutique four-star hotel Kimpton Hotel Palomar San Diego are immersed in "SoCal chic" design, popjazz playing on the hotel's sound system and a tattooed bartender slinging pricey cocktails at the poolside bar on the roof.
Fourteen women, ranging in age from 18 through 22, including one still in high school, may have felt like stars when they walked into these downtown San Diego hotels. But a few hours later they left feeling degraded, abused, underpaid, and humiliated. That's what four of them allege in a lawsuit they filed in June 2016 against Matthew Wolfe, Michael Pratt, Andre Garcia, and their popular amateur website, girlsdoporn.com. Six months later, ten other women joined the lawsuit.
Andre Garcia's Facebook profile photo
According to the lawsuit, the women each entered into financial agreements with the three men for a few hours of filming them having sex for private collectors in Australia or South America. But they allege that the film sessions devolved into a day of rough sex, mistreatment, and lies. It worsened when guarantees of anonymity were broken and the men posted the videos on their popular amateur pornography website, girlsdoporn.com, as well as on to free conglomerate porn sites as a way to advertise. Making matters worse, the women's identities and contact information were leaked on the internet for friends and families to see.
Modeling ads on Craigslist
For the 14 women, and hundreds of others that have appeared on girlsdoporn.com since the website launched in 2011, their introduction to the adult film industry began by searching Craigslist for modeling jobs.
During their search they found one from San Diego-based modeling agencies beginemodeling.com, exploretalent.com, and Bubblegum Casting. The ads were posted on Craigslist pages in cities such as Las Vegas, San Diego, Dallas, Alberta, Canada, Los Angeles, as well as in populous counties in North Carolina, Louisiana, Florida, and Tennessee.
But the so-called modeling agencies were fakes. The blank forms embedded on the websites required that only women between the ages of 18 and 22 apply. Applicants were then asked to submit pictures and list their body dimensions and other personal information.
The pitch
Shortly after submitting the online form, the women say, a phone call came from a man with a thick Australian accent identified as Matthew Wolfe.
Wolfe told them that the gig, while technically considered modeling, is really having sex on camera in exchange for a few thousand dollars. Wolfe says their names would be kept confidential. The videos, only in DVD format, are only sold to private buyers and independent video stores in Australia and South America and are not for release on the web or in the US.
To sweeten the deal, Wolfe promises an all-expenses paid trip to San Diego. The videos are shot at upscale hotels along San Diego Bay and throughout San Diego County, at hotels such as the Kimpton Palomar Hotel, the Coronado Island Marriott, the Hard Rock Hotel, the Hilton Bayfront, and the La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla.
According to the lawsuit, Wolfe offers the women anywhere from $2000 to $5000 for a few hours of "work." If still on the fence, Wolfe provides them a reference; a woman they can speak to who recently shot a video with the men and can attest to their professionalism and that the models' true identities remain hidden.
When the women agree, Wolfe acts fast to book their travel in order to prevent them from backing out.
The lawsuit addresses what is a growing trend in the adult film industry, which features young women, oftentimes still in their teens, appearing in amateur and "reality" adult films.
The younger the girls are, the better, for Wolfe, Pratt, and Garcia, according to the website's social media profiles.
"Just finished shooting a girl still in high school..." read a post on the website's Instagram page in April 2014.
Three months later the men bragged about another woman.
"Shooting a girl who turned 18 ten days...ago. Happy late birthday," reads the profile followed by a smiley face emoticon.
And... action
Once in San Diego, the young women were brought to their hotel rooms where they are handed contracts to sign. According to the lawsuit, the men rush the women to sign quickly so they can get started filming. In some cases, the lawsuit alleges, they tell them it is only for tax purposes and legalese that the women need not concern themselves with. The contracts say nothing of private buyers.
The filming begins. The women sit on the bed. Wolfe, in Australian accent, interviews them. He tells them to state their age. He asks if they are nervous; if they work or go to school. He asks why they decided to do a porn video. Most of the women respond that they are in need of cash. Some say the money will help pay for college tuition. Wolfe then asks more personal questions: how old they were when they lost their virginity, if they have boyfriends, and whether they told anyone they were going to do a porn film?
It is then that Andre Garcia, the actor enters. Garcia likes it rough. He slaps them. Forces copulation. Filming lasts a number of hours and involves several takes, the women allege. Three of the four women who filed the lawsuit claim that the men ignored them when they expressed discomfort or wanted to stop filming.
Reads the lawsuit, "After the filming begins, and/or when the young women are told what to do, if they refuse or say they are uncomfortable or in pain, the defendants often yell at them saying it is too late to change their minds and they cannot leave the hotel room. Further, the filming often takes much longer than the[y] promised - often the young women are confined in the hotel room and forced to film and have sex for many hours. Even worse, the young women are sometimes forced to have sex when not filming to appease [Garcia]."