Parade owner Peter Burns, 40, admitted eight charges under the Video Recordings Act. Magistrates received information of how Burns’ shop stocked unlicensed and unclassified videos.
In November 2004, police seized 33 bags of DVDs and videos, worth about $88,000 from Parade after a tip-off from a rival sex shop.
According to police, an undercover trading standards officer bought a video in the shop on Nov. 16 last year, which had no classification certificate. Later that day, trading standards, police and licensing officials visited the shop and seized 941 videos, 228 DVDs, 296 video cases and 137 DVD cases. Of those, 929 had no classification certificate or were classed as R18 – which only licensed sex shops can sell. Parade does not have a license, police said.
Burn’s attorney, Geoff Clapp, told a U.K. court that the case is a result of business rivalry.
“There are two licensed sex shops in Carlisle and two unlicensed,” he said. “Mr. Burns runs one of the unlicensed shops as manager. It was a complaint from one of the licensed shops which led to this.”
Clapp said Burns could not afford a license to sell R18 tapes, which would cost about $19,400. He added that Parade has sold tapes for almost 17 years without objection and that the videos have no British classification because they were imported.
“Mr. Burns has been in this business for a number of years and knows what it is right to sell,” he said. “There was no child pornography, no animal pornography, no unattributed Internet stuff. Everything he sells is above board and legal except that it hadn’t received the certification.”
