That's what Denise Grollmus, a writer at the Cleveland Scene, learned when she discovered a page devoted to "Ronnie Shelton Ohio Rape Photos." Shelton has a particularly heinous distinction in the Midwest, where he raped 28 women in their homes between 1983 and 1988. Though the site doesn't provide actual photos of the attacks, it pushes surfers toward other web pages offering porn based on real stories. The initial links that pulled surfers into the rape-porn rabbit hole, however, were sites devoted to folk art, dogs or home improvement that the original owners had discontinued -- with no idea that their creations would later be used to advertise violent sex.
Grollmus traced the site to owners Alex Beliy and Roman Ovsiannikov, who reportedly lived in Denver.
Anthony Camera
Home page: Many rape-porn sites were registered to
individuals living in this central Denver apartment
building.
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At 1061 Elizabeth Street, to be exact. And Eva Boitschev, the building's manager, confirms that Ovsiannikov and Beliy lived in apartment 106. "It was back in 2001, for about seven months," she says, adding that she had to evict them for housing too many people in the small apartment.
Boitschev says she hasn't heard from either of them since. But Ovsiannikov stuck around Colorado long enough to get a speeding ticket, on which his birth year is listed as 1981. And another person at the building says that while Ovsiannikov was deported, last he heard the young man was back in Colorado, with a new name.
And apparently new business opportunities.
Vitaly, who's denied being either Ovsiannikov or Beliy, has stopped responding to Westword's inquiries. But the university hijackings continue, with both the University of Indiana and Watkins College of Art and Design in Nashville falling prey this fall. The latest portal to pop up when you Google "rape porn" is a biotechnology class website hosted by the University of California at San Diego.
From biotech, it's a quick trip to violent sex photos that show a young female pinned to the carpet with a knife at her throat, her mouth and wrists bound in tape. She is crying. The text promises gang rape, torture and blood. Memberships to this rape-porn site start at $39.95. A pop-up pushes another rape-porn site, Fantasy Promotions. And a bulletin announces the launch of Forcedteenagers.com: "Yes, another teen site you might think, but all our stats point towards a still very untapped market, when it comes to mixing beautiful innocent teens and forced sex. We have gotten as good ratios from Forced Teenagers as we have done from our other block buster site Forced Teen Movies, so expect another solid cash cow from Forced Teenagers."
And as for the teenagers attending UCSD, whose site has been hijacked by this trash? "No comment," says Pat JaCoby of the school's communications department, who hadn't heard about the rape-porn link until he was contacted by Westword. "Inappropriate use of Internet technology is everywhere. So when we see inappropriate use, we remove it as soon as possible. Creative hackers can produce this kind of material and affiliate it with different websites. They're being proactive, and we can only be reactive."
