Homeless Paid $50 to Get Beat Up in Fetish Videos

Owners of a Florida Internet company are being sued for paying homeless men $50 to be filmed while women punched and kicked them in dominatrix fetish videos, according to court documents. The company sells "beatdown videos" of women attacking men for up to $900 on its site at Shefights.net. The suit charges that the St. Petersburg business violates a state law against hate crimes. Some of the homeless have been hospitalized as the result of the beatings, and men have suffered broken ribs and a dislocated jaw, according to the suit. A homeless advocate became suspicious months ago when he saw several men on local streets with limps, bruises, and split lips.

The Shefights website boasts of men in "excruciating pain" after their beatings by buff young women in scanty gym clothes. "What kind of a society would allow this to happen?" asked lawyer Neil Chonin. Victims desperate for cash are taken to a film spot where they were beaten sometimes while in handcuffs or shackles, Chonin said. An owner of the company said the charges would be "disproved," but offered no details. Police have been investigating the operation for months. "Anything involving bodily harm to someone invites scrutiny to see if laws have been broken," a police spokesman told the St. Petersburg Times. (More Shefights stories.)