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Topics relate to adult business, the War on Drugs, political prosecutions, censorship, and police, prosecutorial, and judicial misconduct

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Orlando Conspiracy Case Sentences

The defendants are all from Eastern Europe and five of the six that were convicted on a variety of counts by a federal jury in Orlando were sentenced today. One defendant - Saida Babaeva - was not sentenced today, though there is no information as to why.

The case that prosecutors and media hyped as a "sex-trafficking ring" but really was no more than simple massage without a license is almost over for all involved. The sentences:

Natalia Fedorova - Time Served
Aleksandra Liubina - Time Served
Alina Priadko - Time Served
Alexander Postica - 15 months
Tatiana Belinschi - 16 months

Russian sex-ring members sentenced

I really feared for Tatiana and Alexander because of the way the USAO charged this case. Each has been in jail (Orange County Jail as of now) since being indicted over a year ago. With time off for good behavior they should be free, or at least on the way to deportation, before March 2012 is over and perhaps sooner.

Though the prosecutors were not fair in charging this case and I didn't understand the jury convicting anyone, the judge has been more than fair. I wish the very best future to each defendant. If any would like their names removed from articles on this blog, or even the articles removed, contact me and it will be done.

I have already had one request from a defendant's family to remove the name or the posts about this case. All posts that discuss this Orlando case will be removed by tomorrow except this one will remain to counter any false information that refers to this case as "sex trafficking". It was an unbelievable and horrible awakening for these defendants.

Edit on 27 February 2012 @12:15pm EST

This morning Saida Babaeva was sentenced to "Time Served". I have read all of the documents that Saida's attorney submitted for sentencing and it appears that she is seeking asylum, though the reasons are personal and won't be noted herein.


Final defendant in Russian sex-trafficking ring sentenced to time served

If luck is with us, this is the last fucking time we will see an article so incorrectly titled by the Orlando Sentinel's pro-MBI and pro-prosecutor editor. No one in this case was charged with "sex-trafficking" and it was certainly not a sex-trafficking case.

If you missed it - I had already created the label "Sex Trafficking Trial - Orlando" as a result of the Sentinel's original incorrectly titled articles. Once I had access to my PACER account and read the case documents, I referred to it as the "Orlando Conspiracy Trial" because that is what it was.

If you would like any of the documents in this case contact me.

16 comments:

CLE Kevin said...

did they get the 15 and 16 months just for not having a license?

Vicky Gallas said...

Obviously not, but you would have to have read some of the 15 lengthy posts that I deleted the other night and the lengthy list of documents deleted in the last couple of weeks.

I did the deleting because these people are all 25-30 years old, this case is really over, and each deserves a fresh start with this BS case buried.

In some situations there were "happy endings". It most certainly was a selective prosecution. Any of the ads placed on Backpage were more tame than any that I have ever seen.

Vicky Gallas said...

To add to my last comment:

Having grown-up in France and Germany and not in the US, I can tell you that the views of sexuality and even touching are vastly different. The way a person thinks about some things in life are ingrained and do not change when a jet lands on US soil.

I truly believe that these defendants had no clue that anything they did could be viewed as "prostitution". When I came to the US long ago, I thought of "prostitution" as something that happened in brothels... not even related to a private "happy ending" in a massage parlor or an escort service. "Escort Service" was not a bad word(s) to me.

American viewpoints on anything sexual are not natural to me. But if I arrived from Eastern Europe and watched how it all really works here, with all of the explicit ads on Backpage and on many websites, I would not know that so much is illegal. There are laws about everything here, unlike most areas of the world.

We legislate morality in the US, but clearly this is not a viable agenda. No one that seeks to control others' morality would ever admit it though. We are pure contradiction here. This is x10 in Orlando.

These defendants were in the wrong place (Orlando) at the wrong time and otherwise this case would never have been prosecuted to begin with. If not for the MBI, this would not be a case. Nothing warned these people what they were in for here.

Anonymous said...

i wish you could know all the truth... not from orlando sentinel, not from google, but from one of the defendants( there was no conspiracy, no trafficking, no sex and by the way some of the defendants are absolutely legal in this country). everything is made up. its not my opinion, that`s the truth.period

Vicky Gallas said...

I do know the truth. I read every document in this case and I still have all documents if you'd like a copy. I do know that there was no "sex trafficking" and no conspiracy. I call it a "conspiracy" case because that is how it was charged. The Orlando Sentinel called it a "sex trafficking" to get attention.

This was an MBI case. You are telling the wrong person - I know exactly how these people operate. They created a partner for me and charged us with RICO conspiracy. Yeh - we conspired to have lunch...lol. They are totally fucking whacked beyond anything else you will ever experience in your life.

As a former defendant, I can tell you that few people will believe you.

Anonymous said...

I would like to know what would happen if some of defendant tell what this case was really about. How would Orlando Sentinel react? Or they only write all bullshit that government provide them?

Vicky Gallas said...

Well, that is how all mainstream newspapers in the US are. They print whatever bullshit prosecutors ask them to print.

Really it is not the writer of the article - it is the newspaper editor - that decides how an article is presented. The writer may have written it entirely different and then the editor makes the changes before it is published. Law enforcement and prosecutors are in-touch with editors, not with writers.

There are still two Orlando Sentinel articles out there in cyberspace about my trial (ended January 17, 2003) - one was during trial and the other was after the jury acquitted me on both counts. The articles do not discuss anything from my trial that was unfavorable to the MBI or the prosecutors. Really they mainly discuss the testimony of escorts that worked for my co-defendant, but claim the escorts worked for me. They take it an additional step and put words in my mouth.

When I read one of the articles I was angry and contacted the reporter. He stated that the article was published the way that his editor wanted it published. He added that I could not file any sort of lawsuit because the statements in question were not in quotation marks. - They wrote it as:

Gallas stated blah, blah, blah....

Not as:

Gallas stated, "Blah, blah, blah...."

I was not interested in any lawsuit over it anyway. I just didn't understand how they could print lies. That was my first real lesson in how mainstream newspapers work.

Anonymous said...

The most confusing thing for me is how come the jure found 6 people guilty and 5 not guilty in conspiracy case!???? Why those 5 were arrested at all? Doesnt it prove that there was not any conspiracy between them?

Anonymous said...

One more thing.. As I understand the four girls which got "time served" had the same counts. And I also know that two of them served 10 month in jail when other two just 5 month! Again How come all of them got time served!?? so girls served several month in jail overtime??? For what?

Vicky Gallas said...

Well, we could view that in various ways:

1. Just because the jury convicted 6 of the defendants does not mean that they were guilty.

2. There was enough evidence (probable cause) for indictment, but not enough for conviction.

3. The entire case was a sham - more so for some defendants than for others.

I truly do not believe that any of these defendants conspired to do anything except make money. On occasion a few of the defendants provided extra services for more money in each of their pockets. Roman Caraiman didn't conduct due diligence before deciding on Orlando - if he had, none of this would have ever happened.

The jury found me not guilty on racketeering and conspiracy to commit racketeering (RICO) too, but the great majority of the population views me as guilty for existing and being in the escort business, and I had licenses that stated "escort services".

In the US, to be general at least with the majority, the people view the defendant to be guilty if arrested. They do not want the jury system or judges. They convict on arrest. We have one of the worst criminal justice systems in the world, but no one realizes that unless it's happened to them or someone close to them.

Vicky Gallas said...

On the "time served" stuff:

In my opinion, and I may be incorrect, by the time the trial was over, prosecutors and the judge wanted to wash it away. By sentencing the four defendants to "time served" and the two defendants to 15 and 16 months, they minimize the chances of appeals and the truth of how much of a waste this prosecution was coming out.

The two defendants that were given 15 and 16 months will be free within a week or two with time off for good behavior and do they really want to appeal that? No, I seriously doubt it.

The reality is that each count against each defendant has prison sentences of up to 5 years. So 10 counts could have been up to 50 years.

I know of someone else that faced similar charges for committing similar acts, pled guilty to two counts, and was sentenced to 5 years. He is still on federal probation.

Vicky Gallas said...

One last note on this case:

Most (not all) of the convicted defendants attorneys have filed a Notice of Appeal and intend to appeal the judgment and sentence.

It's always worth a shot in the dark, but the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals is not friendly to anyone involved in adult business.

These defendants do not need to be here for the appeals process. I just see no real point unless there's a desire to live in the US.

Anonymous said...

There was no real point to prosecute them as well! but the goverment did! Maybe these convicted people dont agree with it and want to go till the end!
I respect them for this!

beau geste said...

Hey, there! I was wondering if you still had a copy of the files in this case? and good stuff your blog. Like that you actually research before you write/speak. Thanks!

Vicky Gallas said...

Yes, I still have all - literally- documents from this case.

Initially (first post) I did not research and believed the charges stated by the Orlando Sentinel. I couldn't pay my PACER bill to retrieve documents to research and that's why the "sex trafficking" label, but when I finally had access to my account, I saw that there were no such charges. It was filed as a "conspiracy to defraud the US" with some other related counts. This was truly a BS case if I have ever seen one.

Sure - contact me privately please.

Vicky Gallas said...

To add: I left the label as it was to illustrate the problems of believing anything read in mainstream newspapers without verifying through documents.