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NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
April 23, 2002
http://www.nydailynews.com/2002-04-23/News_and_Views/Daily_Dish/a-148565.asp
Rush and Molly: A Nightmare on Dream Street?
Life for the boy band Dream Street is threatening to become a nightmare of porn, babes and booze, according to a complaint filed in Manhattan Supreme Court on the group's behalf.
The gold-record-selling quintet and their parents claim in the court papers that Dream Street's creators have repeatedly offered the teens beer and encouraged them to engage in sex with teenage girls.
Furthermore, they claim a principal of Dream Street Entertainment, Inc., Louis Baldonieri, who helped to create the pop group, is also in the pornography business.
The teens' manager, Jon Stuart, said in an affidavit that Baldonieri, his partner, Brian Lukow, and an associate, Matt Mitchell, "have engaged in a wide range of conduct and activities that plainly threaten and impair the minors' well-being."
The band wants Justice Diane Lebedeff to revoke the court's September 2000 approval of its contract with DSE. (Court approval was necessary because band members were underage.)
Baldonieri and Lukow deny the allegations, charging the parents with trying to "steal" the group now that it is poised to make money.
Dream Street's self-titled first album has sold 703,000 copies since July. Its members include Jesse McCartney, 15, Frank Galasso, 17, Matthew Ballinger, 16, Gregory Raposo, 16, and Christopher Trousdale, 16.
Baldonieri is also a vice president of World Media Group, according to court papers. Stuart's affidavit claims the company produces several porn magazines, including one called Just Come of Age, which Stuart says borders on child pornography.
Baldonieri denies being a pornographer; he called Just Come of Age an "adult sophisticated magazine."
In addition, Mitchell allegedly sent Galasso and Raposo three pornographic e-mails earlier this year and has videotaped the boys getting dressed backstage, according to an affidavit filed by Raposo's mother, Maryann. She also complains that Lukow and Baldonieri are disrespectful to her and the other mothers, calling them "dumb housewives" in front of the boys.
"I have referred to them as worse than that," Baldonieri told The News' Helen Peterson. Baldonieri and Lukow deny offering the boys booze or women.