Steve Sweet Acquitted on All Charges
 

VANCOUVER, B.C ?Steve Sweet, president of Sweet Entertainment Group, was acquitted on all counts of obscenity by a Canadian trail judge last week. Charges stemmed from the distribution of 11 fetish videos that Canadian lawmakers deemed obscene at the time of Sweet's indictment.
Sweet was charged with obscenity on Dec. 6 for combining explicit sex content with violence, torture, and cruelty. He was arrested with three other employees from his company.

Three weeks into the trial, Judge R.R. Low determined based on the advent of the Internet since 1995, that the availability of sexually explicit material has become widespread, mainstream, and requires a certain amount of participatory involvement from the viewer, which in effect would qualify as consensual involvement in the viewing of certain types of explicit or violent content.

The judge also determined that BDSM culture is part of "normal and acceptable adult sexual behavior."

After viewing several examples of fictional work presented by the defense like "American Psycho" and "Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer," that depicted similarly violent content as seen in Sweet's 11 videos, the judge determined that "there was little to distinguish the sexual explicit violence portrayed in the fictional materials from the sexual violence portrayed in the 11 videos."

Based on that assessment and expert witnesses, the judge acquitted Sweet on all 20 counts.

However, according to Chicago lawyer J.D. Obenberger, under Canadian laws, acquittals can be appealed, although it is not yet known if the prosecution will continue to pursue the case.

In Obenberger's words, Sweet's attorney, Paul Kent-Snowsell, did an excellent job of presenting the Sweet defense to the Crown by illustrating that BDSM is a no longer a taboo practice in Canada.

"It appears that Paul did a masterful job of putting on a massive and overwhelming case demonstrating conclusively the degree to which bondage, domination, and S&M literature and practice is practiced in a widespread fashion in Canada," Obenberger told XBiz. "Ever single thing he did in the defense is precisely what will be done by America lawyers in similar cases."

Obenberger pointed out specifically that Kent-Snowsell presented clear and convincing evidence of the mainstream acceptance of BDSM and the people, clubs, publications, and content that represent this popular pornography genre and its widespread dissemination over the Internet.

In proving to the Crown that BDSM is infact a far more acceptable form of entertainment than previously thought, Kent-Snowsell did an in-court Google search, showing the judge that more than 100,000 websites are currently dedicated to BDSM.

"All of these things can and should be done in an obscenity defense," said Obenberger, who added that the judge was reportedly shocked by the prevalence and volume of such material. Obenberger was not present at the trial, but he has read all court papers related to the trial.

Get Friday's news today.... only, on GFY

:1orglaugh

Oh Canada!

Haha

How true is that.

Friday's news or not, it is VERY good news! :thumbsup

Yeah this win needs more publicity for sure.

Its a great case, and stands to be a landmark case for the future.


Why we celebrate negative events more than positives one I have no idea...
Again more than likely a genetic flaw...

Good Job Steve and crew ya done us all well and certainly some can sleep more soundly till it happens to someone else.

A big victory..........way to go Canada.........now only if we could win a few like that here and rub the Ah-turdy General Asshead's nose in it!

:thumbsup

You are one week late man

Who gives a shit how "late" it is, there are people here who haven't seen this yet who might like to.




Who has the link to the original news story? Post it.

Great news.. This is the first ive heard of it..

Now lets see if the company can rebuilt itself back to the heavy punching (and fisting) company it once was..

This is great news.

That's an OUTSTANDING LEGAL Decsion and creates incredibly powerful case law!!!

Wow!!!!!!

The DOJ might be able to fuck with people but at the end of the day I can't see how anything anyone here does could be considered obscene in today's world. Every case they bring is going to go this way in my opinion.



:thumbsup

Seems this attorney really was sharp and at the top of his game.

This trial will effect many others to come now.
This is bigger than many of you think.

Other trial attorneys will take note.

My thoughts exactly..

This is pretty big and great news for us all. Even if it is in Canada..

hell yea NICE NICE NICE :) Now if usa can think this way we all be doing better :)

That's a HUGE win, and I'm sure many others in the extreme content market are celebrating as well. EVen though this was in CA, many legal teams in the US will take note. Maybe we can fight back against this right wing mentality afterall.

sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet :evil-laug

thats nice again

did he get acquitted of spitting in chicks' faces, calling them "dirty little hahahahas" and saying "fuuuuck you" as he nuts in their face? :1orglaugh

Link to the original news article please.

Anyone?

If the model has no problem with it why should you?

You got that one right Boneprone, PK was the one that won Netpond back for Meat. I had the chance to work with both him and Steve.

:thumbsup on making the LAW!!!

Hey thx!

It was a huge victory for us and for Canadian content producers for sure.

Here's links to our press release and to the judge's 25 page decision:

PRESS RELEASE

JUDGE'S DECISION

Again, we'd like to thank all of those who supported us in this case!