The latest in the Rentboy case/scandal is that five of the employees who were among the seven people indicted are seeking plea deals.
Str8UpGayPorn snagged the court documents, which were filed on Friday, in which attorneys for defendants Shane Lukas (Hawk Kincaid), Sean Belman (Sean Van Sant), Edward Estanol (Eli Lewis), Diana Milagros Mattos (Coco Lopez), and Clint Calero have requested delays in indictments so that ongoing plea negotiations can take place.
It’s unclear what attorneys for CEO Jeffrey Hurant and employee Marco Decker will be seeking, or if they are also going to be filing separate motions for plea deals.
As you surely know, Rentboy.com’s Manhattan offices were raided on August 25th and all seven people arrested as part of a bizarre sting by the FBI and Department of Homeland Security. Why they waited 18 years to come after the escort website, and the motivations behind the prosecution remain pretty sketchy, as even the New York Times has pointed out.
Meanwhile, there have been ongoing editorials, pleas, and crowdfunding campaigns to aid the legal defenses of everyone caught up in this. Just yesterday, Justin Vivian Bond wrote a plea for her friend Sean Van Sant on Facebook, pointing to his Fundly page where he’s already raised $40,000 of a desired $100,000. Meanwhile Coco was asking for a modest $2,800 on GoFundMe and has barely raised $1,000 in three weeks.
Related: EVERYONE SHOULD BE OUTRAGED ABOUT THE RENTBOY RAID, AND HERE’S WHY
Who are the prosecutors who are pushing this thing? I don’t mean the local US atty. I mean why don’t you print the names of the Asst. U.S Attys who are actually attempting to prosecute these folks. Their names really need to be spread all over the Internet. I like to know who it is who is wasting my tax dollars.