0004133373@mcimail.com (Donald E. Kimberlin) (02/17/91)
The following AP story appeared in Saturday morning papers
around the country:
SATELLITE TRANSMISSION OF PORN BRINGS FINE
By Peg McEntee, Associated Press
SALT LAKE CITY - A Federal jusge on Friday fined a New York
City satellite company $150,000 for broadcasting pornographic movies
by satellite to some 30,000 subscribers throughout the continental
United States.
U.S. District Judge accepted a plea-bargain agreement between
Home Dish Only Satellite Networks Inc. and prosecutors in which the
firm pleaded guilty to a single count of broadcasting an obscene film
via satellite.
HDO is the first and so far only company prosecuted under a
1988 federal law prohibiting satellite a cable broadcasting if mater-
ial deemed pornographic.
Part of a proposed consent decree calls for HDO to erase its
taped movies. And the principals of the now-defunct company, Paul
L. Klein and Jeffrey Younger, also agreed not to promote or distribute
sexually explicit films.
In exchange, Federal attorneys agreed not to prosecute Klein
and Younger personally, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Lambert.
HDO also has pleaded guilty to a Federal charge filed in
Buffalo. Sentencing for that charge is scheduled March 18.
The consent decree would be essentially the same for the Utah
and New York cases, attorneys said.
HDO began operating the American Exxxtasy Channel in 1986. It
shipped movies to U.S. Satellite, Inc. at Murray, Utah, which beamed
them to a GTE Spacenet Corp. satellite for relay to subscribers.
Defense attorney Rodney Snow said HDO abandoned the channel
after the indictment was filed a year ago rather than endure a lengthy
court fight.
The company's films and short movies were scrambled so they
could be received only by subscribers who paid $260 a year for the
Exxxtasy channel. But the company advertised each night in
unscrambled commercials.
* * * * * *
(Hmmmm ... seems I recall it was GTE Spacenet who cut off Exxxtasy the
day they heard a Federal indictment connected them with the case; not
that Exxxtasy voluntarily shut down. Also, I never noted that GTE
proudly announced or published to the public or its shareholders about
having such a client!)