Policy Expert Warns Kentucky Governor May Sue Adult Websites

FRANKFORT, Ky. — A policy expert warns that Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear may soon apply the same tactic to online adult websites that he has applied to Internet gambling — having them forfeit the domains to the state by taking owners to court.

In a post discussing Beshear’s lawsuit against 141 gambling websites on Reason Magazine’s website, senior editor Radley Balko predicts the next move with just one ominous sentence.

“Seems like the Internet porn industry would be the next logical target,” Balko writes.

Balko was a policy analyst at the Cato Institute “specializing in civil liberties issues” and has written for a slew of mainstream news outlets, including the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times, according to his bio. He didn’t immediately return an XBIZ email seeking comment.

According to an article in the Louisville Courier-Journal, Franklin Circuit Judge Thomas Wingate on Oct. 16 denied a motion to dismiss Beshear’s lawsuit against the gambling sites. Wingate ruled Beshear “has the right to decide whether control of the sites must be forfeited to the state,” according to the newspaper.

Wingate set the next hearing date for Nov. 17.

Beshear filed suit last month to force the sites to block access by Kentucky users and pay damages, or forfeit the site’s domain name.

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