After the US government’s prosecution of a pornography company owner collapsed last month, the British anti-porn campaign has suffered a setback. The Register reports on the case:
A stunning reversal for police and prosecution in North Wales may herald the beginning of the end for controversial legislation on possession of extreme porn.
The case, scheduled to be heard yesterday in Mold Crown Court, was the culmination of a year-long nightmare for Andrew Robert Holland, of Coedpoeth, Wrexham, Clwyd as the CPS declined to offer any evidence, and he left court a free man. The saga began last summer when, following a tip-off, police raided Holland’s home looking for indecent images of children. They found none, but they did find two clips, one involving a woman purportedly having sex with a tiger, and one which is believed to have depicted sado-masochistic activity between adults.
Despite Holland’s protests that he had no interest in the material, and that it had been sent to him unsolicited “as a joke”, he was charged with possessing extreme porn. In a first court appearance in January of this year, the “tiger porn” charge was dropped when prosecuting counsel discovered the volume control and at the end of the action heard the tiger turn to camera and say: “That beats doing adverts for a living.”
The laws are seriously skewed when the potential punishment for simple possession of “extreme” pornography approaches the actual punishment for serious violent crime.
Will somebody think of the tigers?
Comment by Flea — August 6, 2010 @ 10:36