State v. Valdes
| Decision Date | 15 November 1989 |
| Docket Number | Nos. 89-KA-451,89-KA-467 and 89-KA-571,89-KA-462,89-KA-464,s. 89-KA-451 |
| Court | Court of Appeal of Louisiana — District of US |
| Parties | STATE of Louisiana v. Maya VALDES, Brian Baudean, Michael Jones & Major Video. STATE of Louisiana v. Dawn DIAZ, Peter Billiot, Robert Wilson & Major Video. STATE of Louisiana v. Torisia HOTARD, Alvin Hotard, Welton Danos, Al's Video. STATE of Louisiana v. Michael KNAPS, the Video Station. STATE of Louisiana v. Amy THIALER, Warren K. Hildebrand, the Video Connection. |
Phillip A. Wittmann, Richard C. Stanley, and Mary L. Dumestre, Stone, Pigman, Walther, Wittmann & Hutchinson, New Orleans, for defendants-appellants.
John M. Mamoulides, Dist. Atty., Harold A. Buchler, Jr., and Dorothy A. Pendergast, Asst. Dist. Attys., Twenty-Fourth Judicial Dist. Parish of Jefferson, Gretna, for plaintiff-appellee.
Before BOWES, GRISBAUM and GOTHARD, JJ.
These cases were consolidated for appeal following various district court rulings finding five video cassettes obscene, in violation of La.R.S. 14:106. We affirm.
The sole question presented is whether the trial court erred in finding the films "Push It To The Limit," "Hot Merchandise," "The Best of John Leslie--Wet Shots," (Vol. I), "Blue Ribbon Blue," and "Jane Bond Meets Thunderthighs" obscene.
The Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Department seized several adult video cassettes from various video stores. The State subsequently petitioned to have the videos declared obscene. Following adversarial hearings and after viewing the films, the district court found the films to be obscene. The defendants now appeal.
La.R.S. 14:106(A)(3) defines obscenity as the intentional
Sale, allocation, consignment, distribution, dissemination, advertisement, exhibition, or display of obscene material, or the preparation, manufacture, publication, or printing of obscene material for sale, allocation, consignment, distribution, advertisement, exhibition, or display.
Obscene material is any tangible work or thing which the trier of fact determines (a) that the average person applying contemporary community standards would find, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, and (b) depicts or describes in a patently offensive way, hard core sexual conduct specifically defined in Paragraph (2) above, and (c) the work or thing taken as a whole lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.
La.R.S. 14:106(A)(2)(b) provides:
Hard core sexual conduct is the public portrayal, for its own sake, and for ensuing commercial gain of:
(i) Ultimate sexual acts, normal or perverted, actual, simulated, or animated, whether between human beings, animals, or an animal and a human being; or
(ii) Masturbation, excretory functions or lewd exhibition, actual, simulated, or animated, of the genitals, pubic hair, anus, vulva, or female breast nipples; or
(iii) Sadomasochistic abuse, meaning actual, simulated or animated, flagellation, or torture by or upon a person who is nude or clad in undergarments or in a costume that reveals the pubic hair, anus, vulva, genitals, or female breast nipples, or in the condition of being fettered, bound, or otherwise physically restrained, on the part of one so clothed; or
(iv) Actual, simulated, or animated touching, caressing, or fondling of, or other similar physical contact with a pubic area, anus, female breast nipple, covered or exposed, whether alone or between humans, animals, or a human and an animal, of the same or opposite sex, in an act of apparent sexual stimulation or gratification; or
(v) Actual, simulated, or animated stimulation of a human genital organ by any device whether or not the device is designed, manufactured, or marketed for such purpose.
La.R.S. 14:106(F) provides:
(1) Except for those motion pictures, printed materials, and photographic materials showing actual ultimate sexual acts or simulated or animated ultimate sexual acts when there is an explicit, closeup depiction of human genital organs so as to give the appearance of the consummation of ultimate sexual acts, no person, firm, or corporation shall be arrested, charged, or indicted for any violations of a provision of this Section until such time as the material involved has first been the subject of an adversary hearing under the provisions of this Section, wherein such person, firm, or corporation is made a defendant and, after such material is declared by the court to be obscene, such person, firm, or corporation continues to engage in the conduct prohibited by this Section. The sole issue at the hearing shall be whether the material is obscene.
(2) The hearing shall be held before the district court having jurisdiction over the proceedings within seventy-two hours after receipt of notice by the person, firm, or corporation. The person, firm, or corporation shall be given notice of the hearing by registered mail or by personal service on the owner, manager, or other person having a financial interest in the material; provided, if there is no such person on the premises, then notice may be given by personal service on any employee of the person, firm, or corporation on such premises. The notice shall state the nature of the violation, the date, place, and time of the hearing, and the right to present and cross-examine witnesses.
(3) The state or any defendant may appeal from a judgment. Such appeal shall not stay the judgment. Any defendant engaging in conduct prohibited by this Section subsequent to notice of the judgment, finding the material to be obscene, shall be subject to criminal prosecution notwithstanding the appeal from the judgment.
The First Amendment protects all ideas having the slightest redeeming social importance, even those ideas which may be considered by some as unorthodox, controversial, or even hateful to the prevailing climate of opinion. However, the First and Fourteenth Amendments are not absolutes and have never been treated as such by the courts. Certain ideas may be excluded from their protection if those ideas encroach upon limited areas of more important interests. The United States Supreme Court has categorically rejected the argument that obscenity falls within the purview of protected speech, finding it implicit in the history of the First Amendment that obscenity is rejected as being utterly without redeeming social importance. Miller v. California, 413 U.S. 15, 93 S.Ct. 2607, 37 L.Ed.2d 419 (1973). Accord Roth v. United States, 354 U.S. 476, 77 S.Ct. 1304, 1 L.Ed.2d 1498 (1957).
A factual determination of obscenity by the district court necessarily encompasses a determination of unprotected speech. Therefore, it is imperative that the appellate court make an independent constitutional judgment as to whether the material is indeed obscene. State v. Walden Book Co., 386 So.2d 342 (La.1980).
In Miller, supra, 93 S.Ct. at 2615 the Supreme Court, recognizing the inherent dangers in attempting to regulate any form of expression, devised the three-part test for determining whether certain material is obscene:
(a) whether "the average person, applying contemporary community standards" would find that the work, taken as a whole appeals to the prurient interests.... (b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offense way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and (c) whether the work taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.
The guidelines set forth in the Miller test have been followed by the Louisiana legislature, which adopted the Miller definition of obscenity and specifically described the types of sexual conduct that would constitute obscenity under La.R.S. 14:106.
As noted by the court in State v. Amato, 343 So.2d 698 (La.1977), sex and obscenity are not synonymous, and nudity alone is not enough to make material legally obscene. It is, therefore, incumbent upon the State to prove that sexually oriented material meets all three requirements of the Miller test. Only then can it be proscribed by law. State v. Luck, 353 So.2d 225 ...
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State v. Valdes
...89-904; 24th Judicial District Court, Div. "B", No. 89-905; 24th Judicial District Court, Div. "J", No. 89-908. Prior report: La.App., 552 So.2d 1372. ...