Nice la Presse Article on XO this morning

[Lunaseraphim]

Alcohol is not criminalized but you can only buy strong alcohol at SAQ and restaurants selling alcohol need to pay for government permit. If your activity is decriminalized it must be regulated as any other economic activity. You must provide documentation (ledgers etc) that reflects your cash flow and the buisiness expenses and fill all the tax documents required for small non-incorporated business. You would also need to pay GST/QST if your activity exceeds $30K/year. For this you need to charge your clients GST/QST on top of your price. There is no way that you can avoid government control and regulations that are mandatory for any small businesses (permits, health issues etc). How you can justify that you can be free from it while hairdresser working at his salon is not. What I am trying to say is that decriminalization and legalization is the same thing.
Government would also push you to move away from pure cash operation and you should be able to accept interact and credit cards payments.

They aren't the same thing. Just go back in the thread.

https://www.nswp.org/sites/default/files/guide_to_legal_models_english_prf04.pdf

Please note that in this guide, they say that sex workers are forced to get STI screenings. the guide frames this as a negative thing, which I understand might be not well perceived here. but the issue is that the clients are not getting screened, but the workers are. and clients are generally the ones who demand unsafe services because of poor sexual education. the first day i stepped into a massage parlor, girls were talking about sti risks. the clients are usually not getting regularly tested

Also, look at the wide number of organizations that are pushing for decriminalizations. NON PROFIT organizations, not organizations of ''high end luxury providers who don't want to pay taxes''

In New Zealand, Belgium and in some areas of Australia, prostitution is decriminalized, not legalized.

 

[EagerBeaver]

Your translator must have missed them because they are clearly laid out under the heading "Les chefs d’accusation" at the end of the article

Anthony thanks for pointing this out, but it doesn't change my response to the James or my post #763 above:

From my Google Translator:
"THE CHARGES
Having benefited from a pecuniary advantage that they knew to be derived from an offense;
Having induced a person to offer sexual services in exchange for remuneration;
Having advertised sexual services."

These sound like bullshit nothing charges to me. The kind that can be quietly resolved.

 

[LeDodo]

Anthony thanks for pointing this out, but it doesn't change my response to the James or my post above:

From my Google Translator:
"THE CHARGES
Having benefited from a pecuniary advantage that they knew to be derived from an offense;
Having induced a person to offer sexual services in exchange for remuneration;
Having advertised sexual services."

These sound like bullshit nothing charges to me. The kind that can be quietly resolved.

Aren't they all charges linked to proxenetism with quite a heavy maximum penalty?

 

[EagerBeaver]

Aren't they all charges linked to proxenetism with quite a heavy maximum penalty?

What is the maximum penalty for these specific charges? There are no charges laid for rape, abuse, use of minors etc.

 

[Glyscore]

What is the penalty for these charges?

Jail time? Aint what Diddy got from these exact same charges lel?

 

[AnthonyAnderson]

These sound like bullshit nothing charges to me. The kind that can be quietly resolved.

They are taken verbatim from the Criminal Code, in French. I will not go as far as providing you with the article number. Kind regards.

 

[EagerBeaver]

Jail time? Aint what Diddy got from these exact dans charges lel?

He was convicted under the U.S. Mann Act - a federal law which involves transportation of prostitutes across state lines. The difference here is the defendants were charged with what I understand to be offenses under Quebec provincial law.

 

[Lunaseraphim]

They are not bullshit charges. And it's not because those are the charges that this is the reason this agency was specifically targeted, otherwise many others would be. If you don't understand that, this means you don't understand how the justice system works. Lawyers know what is most likely to win in a case and what will not be taken seriously by the law, they also know what can be proven, and what can't. In this case it's very easy to prove all of the charges stated above.

 

[EagerBeaver]

We don't know what the evidence is and we don't know what is easy to prove or not. What the law states is:

Benefiting from Sexual Services (Material Benefit - s. 286.2): It is an indictable offence, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, to receive a financial or material benefit knowing it is derived from the commission of a sexual service offence (such as someone buying sex).

Inducing/Procuring (s. 286.3): It is illegal to induce, recruit, or direct a person to offer sexual services, including directing someone into the sex trade.

Advertising Sexual Services (s. 286.4): It is a criminal offence to knowingly advertise the sale of sexual services, such as online, in print, or through other media.

Just because 10 years is a possible penalty doesn't mean any of them will get any jail time. It's all to be determined in Court. Witnesses fold, don't cooperate, do not show. Disappear. Happens all the time. And then the prosecutor bails. Look at what happened with the witnesses in the Canada Hockey case. They were awful, and the case collapsed.

 

[Lunaseraphim]

They are an escort agency. ''benefiting from sexual services'' is what they do. And they do recruit girls. I've had agencies try to recruit me before. Not XO, but I have text messages to prove it lol

 

[RobertNYC]

The James, as an aside, I am not sure there will ever be any update. The La Presse article is very vague on what the actual pending charges are. There is no discussion of there being any charges for rape, abuse, use of minors, etc. which forms a large part of the discussion in this thread. Here is what the article actually says about the charges, from my Google Translator:

"Several charges related to prostitution have been brought against the five alleged ringleaders of the agency, and according to our information, at least two buildings used in the commission of the alleged crimes are subject to a freezing order."

We do not know what the prostitution charges are. They sound like bullshit nothing charges to me. The primary goal was to shut down the agency and that was accomplished. So there is a fair chance, I would think, depending on the priors (if any) of the defendants, to get the charges quietly resolved with no fanfare.

As far as the freezing order goes, that is the problem of XO's landlord. My feeling is that they will probably need to cough up some dough to get rid of that order. Certainly hire some attorneys to get that order discharged. That will quietly go away. The whole thing may go away quietly. But the agency was shut down and that was the main goal of the LE action.

It raises the question of whether the "XO 5" can regroup and start another agency once the smoke clears on the criminal matters. The answer to that question is unknown.

I’m not an attorney but I’ve followed enough US cases similar to this one. See my post regarding JuliesNYC. The conventional wisdom is that the XO group reopens once all this gets resolved. It’s usually about the Benjamin’s (or the Canadian equivalent), and the prosecutors will want to see some CAD forked over.

These types of cases pop up in the US quite a bit, and in vast majority the penalties are paid ….and the owners regroup with the next iteration.

It’s mind boggling the paranoia around clients numbers being investigated, etc. Cue the movie scene: “I am shocked to learn pimping and prostitution were taking place!”

 

[sephron]

Just read this report this morning and to be honest this is one of the biggest reasons I don't like dealing with agencies. There are too many risky variables. Their website is still live too (will probably get shut down in the coming months) but yeah stay away from this place

 

[CLOUD 500]

He was convicted under the U.S. Mann Act - a federal law which involves transportation of prostitutes across state lines. The difference here is the defendants were charged with what I understand to be offenses under Quebec provincial law.

No, these are Federal charges it just happens it is being prosecuted provincially.

 

[Verbal Kint]

Jail time? Aint what Diddy got from these exact dans charges lel?

Diddy got caught on what they call in the state: The Mann act.
Crossing state line with individuals for the purpose of debauchery...
Not to ease on what Diddy did or didn't do, what stuck to him in the end was an old racist law of 1910...
I don't think this applies to this case in particular.

 

[interferon]

Aren't they all charges linked to proxenetism with quite a heavy maximum penalty?

proxenetism? You need a phd to read this board now!

 

[Julia Sky]

Alcohol is not criminalized but you can only buy strong alcohol at SAQ and restaurants selling alcohol need to pay for government permit. If your activity is decriminalized it must be regulated as any other economic activity. You must provide documentation (ledgers etc) that reflects your cash flow and the buisiness expenses and fill all the tax documents required for small non-incorporated business. You would also need to pay GST/QST if your activity exceeds $30K/year. For this you need to charge your clients GST/QST on top of your price. There is no way that you can avoid government control and regulations that are mandatory for any small businesses (permits, health issues etc). How you can justify that you can be free from it while hairdresser working at his salon is not. What I am trying to say is that decriminalization and legalization is the same thing.
Government would also push you to move away from pure cash operation and you should be able to accept interact and credit cards payments.

Alcohol and weed are legalized, not decriminalized, case in point. They are not the same thing.

Escorts already have to pay taxes. In fact you're going to shit yourself when you learn there's already a business code for escorting specifically!!

We dont charge the tax on top of our rate - it is factored in. The same way plenty of professionals don't explicitly charge it but it's factored in the price.

Also many businesses aren't regulated in this manner. There are general laws that apply to everyone, but not every single industry has industry specific mandatory rules...

 

[EagerBeaver]

I’m not an attorney but I’ve followed enough US cases similar to this one. See my post regarding JuliesNYC. The conventional wisdom is that the XO group reopens once all this gets resolved. It’s usually about the Benjamin’s (or the Canadian equivalent), and the prosecutors will want to see some CAD forked over.

These types of cases pop up in the US quite a bit, and in vast majority the penalties are paid ….and the owners regroup with the next iteration.

It’s mind boggling the paranoia around clients numbers being investigated, etc. Cue the movie scene: “I am shocked to learn pimping and prostitution were taking place!”

I agree with you and that's exactly what I was suggesting. I could be wrong but it's my sense of what will happen.

 

[Julia Sky]

I honestly can't believe this thread has now reached 40 pages

 

[EagerBeaver]

I honestly can't believe this thread has now reached 40 pages

Probably a 5 day record for MERB. Just a guess. I don't recall any threads more explosive that did not get shut down. I am not suggesting that this thread should be shut down, but usually in the past threads that had heavy debate eventually did for one reason or another. I think the XO story fostered debate on many different issues surrounding how agencies operate, and it's a good thing to have these debates. In my estimation this thread has had healthy and thoughtful debate and contributions from MANY posters including the SPs, the clients and even an "anonymous" agency owner.

 

[CLOUD 500]

proxenetism? You need a phd to read this board now!

Another word for pimping.