Features

Candida Martinez, booking agent for the Shattuck Down Low, stood in the drizzle Friday evening watching the picketers in downtown Berkeley and remarked on the irony that women opposing sexual slavery would demonstrate against Girl Fest, another organization fighting sexual exploitation of women. 

But Marcia Poole, of Women Against Sexual Slavery, saw some irony of her own. 

“The building [where Girl Fest was having a party] is owned by the biggest sex slaver in Berkeley,” she said in a phone interview Friday afternoon, referring to Lakireddy Bali Reddy, whose family business owns the building at 2284 Shattuck Ave., where the Down Low is located. 

In 2001, Reddy, a wealthy Berkeley landowner, was sentenced to eight years in prison, convicted, among other charges, of transporting minors to the U.S. for illegal sex and work. 

“Shame on Girl Fest for Supporting Sexual Slavery,” read the sign carried by protester Diana Russell, an emeritus professor at Mills College who has written extensively on women and child abuse. 

Joel Mark’s sign said: “This building owned by sex-slaver Reddy; boycott Girl Fest concert.”  

The evening event at Down Low was the kick-off party for a weekend Girl Fest conference, mostly held at UC Berkeley. There would be panels, film, music, art, spoken word and dance aiming to educate people on preventing violence against women. Girl Fest is produced under the auspices of the nonprofit The Safe Zone Foundation, based in Hawaii where the organization has put on annual Girl Fest conferences since 2003. 

“They’re going to be in the building where the girls worked as indentured servants,” Poole said, underscoring that the Down Low business owner would give rent money to the Reddys that he took from bar receipts that night. 

Kathryn Xian, who calls herself Girl Fest’s “Non-Executive” director, said she’d heard about the Reddys’ ownership and history some three weeks earlier, but she had a different view of holding the event at that particular nightspot. 

“They own the land, not the club,” she said by phone. “The land existed before the Reddy family. We’ll send a message to all sex traffickers. We’re going in there to reclaim the land that has been taken away from all women.” 

And, she added, “The Down Low owner (Daniel Cukierman) wants to do it here—to be loud and proud about it.”  

That evening, as Poole and the others picketed, Cukierman stood beside Martinez at the door of his club watching them: “The Girl Fest is a good organization; they do good work. We’re honored to have them here,” he said. 

At the last minute, Councilmember Kriss Worthington offered to help Girl Fest find another venue, but says he was not taken up on the offer. While he was not at the picket, Worthington said he supported it. 

“The City Council supported the boycott of [Reddy-owned restaurant] Pasands,” he said. “We expressed strong opposition to the horrible abuse of immigrant women and girls.” 

Poole said it was important to remember what the Reddy family had done. In addition to the conviction of Lakireddy Reddy, his sons Vijay and Prasad Lakireddy were convicted of similar but lesser charges. Vijay served two years in prison and Prasad got probation. Lakireddy’s uncle, Jayprakash Lakireddy and his aunt, Annapuma Lakireddy, pled guilty to immigration fraud and did not receive jail time.  

The immigration fraud and sexual abuse came to light after 17-year-old Chanti Prattpati died in 1999 of carbon monoxide poisoning in a Berkeley apartment owned by the Reddys. The Reddys were not held responsible. 

Prattpati’s 15-year-old sister survived the gas poisoning, caused by a blocked heating vent, and eventually told authorities that she and her sister were brought to the United States and forced to have sex with Reddy and other family members..