Judge Sentences Porn Producer To 46 Months In Prison
Judge Sentences Porn Producer To 46 Months In Prison
But in federal court today, as he faced a federal prison sentence, Paul F. Little trembled and begged a woman for mercy.
"It just seems a very high price to pay, I think," Little told U.S. District Judge Susan Bucklew, "and I ask you to understand how much I've suffered."
Little and his attorneys argued that his conviction in June for 10 counts of distributing obscene materials over the Internet and through the mail had devastated his business and left him near ruin. That, they said, should be punishment enough.
But Bucklew sentenced Little to three years and 10 months in federal prison.
She was unimpressed with Little's apologies, noting he had given interviews in which he ridiculed the charges against him. "He was flip throughout the entire trial," she said. "He wasn't apologetic, as far as I can tell, until this morning."
Little also claimed the videos in question, which were labeled as "Euro" editions, were intended for distribution in the more permissive European market, not the United States. He said he told his distributor not to sell them in the United States.
That, the judge said, is "questionable." She said she believed prosecutors when they said that label was a marketing technique to let buyers know the content was more extreme. "You're either incredibly naïve or you're just not being truthful," she told Little.
Bucklew also ordered Little, 50, to pay a $7,500 fine on his own behalf and another $7,500 on behalf of his company, Max World Entertainment. She leveled $5,000 in special assessments and ordered Little to serve three years of probation after he is released from prison. The company was placed on probation for five years.
The judge granted a defense request that Little be allowed to remain free and surrender when a prison is designated by the bureau of prisons.
According to evidence in the trial, federal investigators in January 2006 purchased an online membership to the Max Hardcore Web site and downloaded five promotional video clips. Then, in March 2007, an undercover postal inspector bought five DVDs from the Web site, having them delivered to a post office box in Tampa.
The videos featured scenes of vomiting and urination, showing women being forced to ingest various bodily fluids.
Federal prosecutor Edward McAndrew, a lawyer with the Justice Department, said the videos were "some of the most extreme material available on the Internet."
"This case is not about the conduct," McAndrew said. "It's not about consenting adults. It's about commercial distribution. … He made a choice that his material would be more extreme than others. What he creates gives mainstream pornography a bad name."
McAndrew said Little was undeterred by his conviction and had sold two of the videos in question after his was convicted.
In seeking a more lenient sentence, one of Little's attorneys argued that the videos were not sadomasochistic. "Urine and vomit, our argument is, isn't sadistic or masochistic," James Benjamin said.
"What about humiliation?" the judge asked.
That, Benjamin replied, isn't in the legal definition of sadomasochistic.
"Clearly, there seemed to be pain," Bucklew said.
That was acting, Benjamin said. "The person that was involved in the conduct sat [in court] with a smile on her face and wrote your honor a letter saying, 'Judge, this was a beautiful part of my life.' "
"I don't even think this is a close call," the judge said. The videos portrayed "sadistic conduct. …This is clearly degrading, clearly humiliating and intended to be so."
Defense attorney Jeffrey Douglas said the conviction has reverberated throughout the adult entertainment industry and marks the first time prosecutors successfully have gone after a pornography producer while granting immunity to the distributor.
Until the videos were ruled by a jury to be obscene, Douglas said, Little had "no way of knowing the activity he was engaged in was criminal."
It was unprecedented, Benjamin said, "to consider a purveyor of dirty movies in the arena of criminal conduct."
"This came out of nowhere," Little said.
Anyone else hear about this? This is the sort of abuse of the legal system that really pisses me off, how can you read the judges comments and NOT think she had an axe to grind with the defendant? Obscenity is so vaguely defined in this country that no one really knows where the line is, and now they want to destroy this mans life over it? All obscenity law should be struck down on constitutional grounds, that's my two cents.
_________________
“The totally convinced and the totally stupid have too much in common for the resemblance to be accidental.”
-- Robert Anton Wilson
Max Hardcore desereves what ever is coming to him, the garbage he makes is only made for the truly deviant.
I only hope he get the same treatment he shows in his videos, only problem is he would probably like it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Hardcore
lelia
Veteran
Joined: 11 Apr 2007
Age: 71
Gender: Female
Posts: 2,897
Location: Vancouver not BC, Washington not DC
Any person who forces women to perform any act for the sexual gratification of others deserves prison, at the very least. The perp/perv got off too lightly.
Although castration may still be an option...
_________________
You people do realize that anyone appearing in his videos did so voluntarily, and for pay, right? It's not as if anyone was forced into doing anything, and that's not what the criminal case was about. Nothing that he did would be considered illegal if done between two consenting adults in the privacy of their home, so why does it become illegal when he videotapes the act and sells it to other consenting adults? It's not like we're talking community standards here, he's not broadcasting his videos or putting them anywhere that anyone who doesn't want to see one would be involuntarily exposed. I'm afraid that because many most people will find this man's work odious, the very real erosion of personal liberties taking place here will be ignored.
_________________
“The totally convinced and the totally stupid have too much in common for the resemblance to be accidental.”
-- Robert Anton Wilson
I think he is disgusting to say the least. Saying that though, if the "actors" in these movies state that they consented to this and that he did not force them to do this, I do not see why he got the punishment he did. If (as awful, discusting and down right wrong it is in my mind) these people did do this without coersion and were told what they were getting into before this, I don't see why it is illegal. Though it is not right for me, I am a firm believer in "to each thier own" as long as it does not hurt anyone.
If even a single "actor" stated that they were pushed into this, then I think he should be nailed to the wall. Until this happens, I truely do not understand the issue.
EDIT: I do not believe on imposing my own moral beliefs onto another as long as everyone involved has all the facts, are mentally aged to the point of complete understanding, completely agree with everything they are doing and it does not hurt others.
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Humm, guess I should put something witty here, huh?
Last edited by Kauf039 on 06 Oct 2008, 8:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.
From the OP article:
Your Honour, the prosecutiuon rests...
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I see absolutely nothing wrong with what he did. These were consenting women, who *wanted* to do this, whether it was acting or not. And I don't think the type of pornography should have anything to do with sentencing him. This actually really pisses me off. This woman is relying to much on her own belief system in this. She obviously was against him from the start.
So where do you draw the line? Should a film version of Lolita be subject to obscenity prosecution because it explores the theme of pedophilia? I'm not going to make the argument that what Max Hardcore was peddling was "art", but I take issue with throwing him in jail because he crossed a very murky boundary that is not very clearly defined from a legal standpoint. His whole business was built around a perceived demand for adult entertainment of a specific nature, and judging from his success, his perception was correct. Why is it any business of ANY government what gets people off? No one was coerced, no underage people where involved, obviously no one thought they were breaking any laws. Also, if the issue was distribution, why was the distributor given immunity while the producer was targeted? This is very obviously an attempt to clamp down on the adult entertainment industry by the morality police, and should be vigorously fought against, regardless of any personal feelings about Max Little.
_________________
“The totally convinced and the totally stupid have too much in common for the resemblance to be accidental.”
-- Robert Anton Wilson
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