August Ames

Early life Ames was born Mercedes Grabowski in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, on August 23, 1994. She grew up in Petawawa, Ontario, and later lived in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Both of her parents were in the army and she spent her early years as a military brat, including a number of years living beside Canadian Forces Base Petawawa.

Ames alleged that she was routinely sexually abused by her paternal grandfather as a child, but her father refused to believe her and she was sent to live in a group home at 12 years old. She also spoke of being enticed to strip by an adult male as a young teenager in exchange for drugs. She was nominated for four AVN Awards in her lifetime, including three nominations for Female Performer of the Year.

In 2016, she appeared in the non-pornographic film Model for Murder: The Centerfold Killer.

Awards 2014 Miss FreeOnes Best Newcomer 2015 AVN Award – Cutest Newcomer (Fan Award) 2015 XRCO Award – Cream Dream 2016 Twistys Treat of the Year 2017 AVN Award – Most Spectacular Boobs (Fan Award) 2017 NightMoves Award – Best Boobs (Editor's Choice)

Personal life Ames was married to Kevin Moore, a pornography producer and director for Evil Angel.

Weeks prior to her death, Ames said that she had a history of bipolar disorder and dissociative identity disorder (DID) due to her traumatic childhood, saying: "Some days I'll be fine and if I'm not doing anything I'll get these awful flashbacks of my childhood and I get very depressed and I can't get out of bed and cancel my scenes for like a week or two."

Death In December 2017, Ames was due to perform in a scene, but withdrew when she learned that the co-star was a man who had appeared in gay pornography. On December 3, 2017, Ames wrote on Twitter:

The tweet drew criticism and abuse from social media users. Ames, who was bisexual, defended her right to exercise her sexual autonomy in a subsequent tweet. According to an article subsequently published in Rolling Stone, the tweet and its response revealed a "schism" in the porn industry between those who believed that there is a lower chance of sexually transmitted infections for women who film with men who perform exclusively with women than with men who perform with both men and women, and those who believed the standard to be flawed and homophobic.

On December 5, 2017, two days after her tweet, Ames was found dead in a park in Camarillo, California, at the age of 23. Her death was ruled a suicide due to asphyxia by hanging by the Ventura County Medical Examiner's Office. Upon her autopsy, toxicology results revealed that she had cocaine, marijuana, the antidepressant sertraline (Zoloft) and the anxiolytic alprazolam (Xanax) in her system at her time of death.

Close friends blamed cyberbullying for her suicide. Her final tweet before suicide had been the words "Fuck y'all." However, questions about the degree to which cyberbullying might have contributed to Ames' death lingered for many months. She texted multiple people after filming to voice her distress over the scene, which was filmed about six weeks before her death.

In the wake of Ames's death and those of other adult performers that year, initiatives within the industry were proposed to deal with the issue, including The August Project, a hotline conceived by Ames' widower, Kevin Moore, and Pineapple Support, a non-profit organization launched in April 2018 by British performer Leya Tanit.