Attorney Lawrence Walters told XBIZ that this appears to be a pre-arranged, pre-packaged deal where all the parties involved came to an agreement in advance.
Walters says the deal was structured in a way where the corporation was charged, not an individual, so no one will be doing time in jail.
As part of the deal, Adult DVD Empire will be on a three-year probation and pay a $75,000 fine.
Federal prosecutors filed the charges July 22 at U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh, charging that the company, which operates AdultDVDEmpire.com, mailed four DVDs containing obscene material to an Erie post office box in May 2007.
Walters says the charges seems to have been initiated by Mary Beth Buchanan, the former U.S. District Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, who was active in obscenity prosecutions
“Maybe now that she’s gone, they wanted to get rid of the case where no one would go to jail,” Walters said. “It was an easy way for the government to save face without a big trial.”
Now that a plea deal has been reached, the obscenity charges against the movies will move forward, and according to Walters, the case will result in a conviction, which does not bode well for adult.
“Anytime a movie is convicted of obscenity, it give the government building blocks to prosecute future obscenity cases.”
The four DVDs are identified as “A Bounty of Pain,” “Shattering Krystal” both from Dan Hawke Productions, “Extreme Tit Torture 18” from Galaxy Productions and “Pussy Torture 8” also from Galaxy and directed by Rick Savage.
XBIZ will continue to follow the story and will have more details as the story develops.
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