PHOENIX—James Larkin, the former CEO of classifieds listing site Backpage.com, committed suicide just days before a retrial was set in a case brought against him and his business partner for violating FOSTA-SESTA statutes.
According to a news blog site affiliated with Larkin and his business partner Michael Lacey called Frontpage Confidential, Larkin was 74 years old when he took his own life on July 31. Lacey, the former executive editor for Village Voice Media, expressed sadness as he gave a final epitaph to his friend of well over four decades.
"Jim was a businessman, and he recognized and created a market for alternative newsweeklies," said Lacey. "He cut trail where most perceived only risk."
Larkin and Lacey transformed the Phoenix New Times into a formidable paper of record covering Maricopa County and the greater Phoenix, Arizona area. This came in the form of taking on major political figures including former Maricopa County sheriff and convicted criminal Joe Arpaio and the late U.S. Senator John McCain.
The two quickly developed a market for alt weekly news outlets and generated a journalism empire that featured the iconic Village Voice, based in New York. Seeing a market for sex personals and classifieds, the pair developed Backpage.com as an early leader in online marketing and a friendly environment to legal and consensual sex work. In 2018, both were indicted by conservative-leaning federal prosecutors for allegedly violating criminal provisions implemented by the Trump-era FOSTA-SESTA law. This has developed into one of the most noteworthy fights over freedom of speech online and the First Amendment ever seen.
A mistrial was declared when an Arizona federal district judge admonished prosecutors for failing to offer up a viable argument in favor of convicting Lacey and Larkin. A retrial was ordered and it was set roughly a week from July 31. Lacey added: "I never saw my friend do a dishonest or dishonorable thing in his entire life. I had a four-decade friendship with a wonderful man."
The case of Lacey and Larkin has been a rallying cry among digital rights activists and civil libertarians. This advocacy has been adopted by many in the adult entertainment industry because FOSTA-SESTA, despite claiming it supports the victims of online sex trafficking, led to a chilling of otherwise legal forms of speech and expression. This is especially the case for sex workers and adult performers who used forms of online communication for conversing with clients.
