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Originally Posted by Webby
Inclined to agree.... tho if it did come to presenting a defense to a jury, it's pretty hard to anticipate the outcome when you could be talking about the "views" of a couple of jurers who, whether we like it or not, can have their own prejudices 
But sure - think there could be a reasonable defense. This is one (or two) areas, unlike the "extreme" element, where the adult industry would need to stand up and be counted. |
Juries are funny entities. I have seated a lot of juries, and even after studying their responses to a written questionniare and then questioning each potential juror individually, there can be surprises. Plus, that one holdout that you may have can end up caving in when the other 11 jurors pressure him into voting to convict. It can be that simple -- 11 jurors think the defendant is guilty, the 12th is convinced that the defendant is not guilty, but after 10 hours of deliberations that 12th juror decides to give up and vote to convict so they can all go home. Maybe the defendant gets lucky and gets me as the 12th juror and I convince the other 11 to vote not guilty!
But it could also end up in a hung jury and the whole trial starts over. The defendant then is faced with more damn attorney fees to go through another trial or throw in the towel and take a plea agreement.
I am hoping that the current obscenity cases go all the way and we get a new more usuable definition of obscenity. The 1973 Miller Test using community standards just does not work in the internet world. It may have been appropriate in 1973 when porn was sold only in bricks and mortar stores or shown in theaters, and we knew what communities were reasonably safe to sell in and which were a prison sentence waiting to happen. Now that the entire internet world is the community and the most conservative community standards can be applied to any content, that test is no longer reasonable.