A Bad Case Makes Worse Law

Cincinnati is a city blessed with more than its share of good restaurants and bad weather, and less than its share of smut. That latter distinction is largely the work of Hamilton County Prosecutor Simon Leis Jr., 42, who has pursued local sex-shop and massage-parlor operators with the zeal of a Torquemada.

Leis last week bagged another saboteur of Cincinnati morals: Larry Flynt, 34, the brassy publisher of Hustler, a three-year-old entry in the crowded skin-magazine business. It happened after a five-week trial, in which lawyers debated the aesthetic qualities of pinup photos, medical and literary experts lectured the jury on the fine points of bestiality and oral sex, and Harold Robbins (The Carpetbaggers) quietly took notes for his next novel. Flynt was sentenced to seven to 25 years in prison and fined $11,000. His crimes: the misdemeanor of pandering obscenity and the felony of "engaging in organized crime." The latter offense, established by a little-used 1974 Ohio statute, includes any illegal act in which five or more people participate. Though Flynt's magazine is edited 105 miles away, in Columbus, and printed 374 miles away, in Milwaukee, Leis succeeded in selling the jury the tortured proposition that Flynt had engaged in organized crime in Cincinnati by virtue of dealing with a magazine distributor there.

If bad cases make bad law, Flynt's may be a classic of the genre. His was one of the most important obscenity trials since the Supreme Court, in Miller v. California (1973), abandoned the notion that there are national standards of what is acceptably sexually explicit in print and film. Instead, the court held that local juries could decide what is obscene for their communities.* Publishers and civil libertarians now fear that Flynt's conviction may encourage local law officials to harass other national publications, including those far more acceptable to most Americans than Flynt's seedy monthlies.

Market Appeal. Champions of free speech spoke up vigorously for Larry Flynt, but it was not easy; what he publishes is in its fashion as outrageous as last week's verdict. Hustler has printed photos of a brunette being ravished by a snake, a pictorial feature of a nude woman 8 1/2 months pregnant, and gruesome illustrations of various genital and gynecological oddities. The cartoons seek sick snickers in such topics as castration, excrement, bestiality and, in one memorably tasteless panel, Betty Ford's breast cancer. Every issue features photographs sent in by readers, displaying the private parts of their wives and girl friends. "We are genuine entertainment with no pretensions," says Flynt. "We have proved that barnyard humor has a market appeal."

Apparently so. Hustler's circulation has climbed in 32 months to nearly 2 million, behind only Penthouse (4.6 million) and Playboy (5.7 million). Nearly all copies of Hustler are offered on newsstands, and most of its advertising is for Flynt-marketed dildos, vibrators and other such recreational equipment. The publisher, who owns his magazine outright, claims he netted $20 million last year, two-thirds of it from Hustler, the rest from his sexual devices and from Chic, a slightly flossier Los Angeles-based sibling magazine he launched last summer.

An eighth-grade dropout who ran away from his old Kentucky home at age 14, Flynt joined the Army, then the Navy, worked the night shift at a General Motors assembly plant and, at the advanced age of 21, went bankrupt. He moved to Columbus, and a few years later, was the proprietor of eight Hustler Club bars. He eventually sold the chain, but not before turning its four-page newsletter into Hustler.

Paunchy, amiable and given to wearing an American-flag pin on the jacket of his colorful leisure suits, Flynt today commands an enterprise that occupies parts of two Columbus office buildings and has more than 150 employees. Associate publisher and chief aide is Althea Leasure, 23, whose prior publishing experience consisted of posing nude for an early Hustler. Larry and Althea, who were married last August, occupy a 27-room Columbus mansion in which they have installed a swimming pool, gold plumbing fixtures, a heart-shaped bathtub and three servants.

Flynt remains a puritan about his work. He puts in 18-hour days, personally approves all Hustler and Chic photo layouts and edits many manuscripts himself. "When I see a long word that I don't know, I take it out," he says. Lately Flynt has hired experienced editors to help him, waged a high-minded campaign against smoking and scored a minor coup by signing Norman Mailer to do an interview with John Ehrlichman--for $12,500. Untaken offers include $1 million each to Gloria Steinem, Raquel Welch, Julie Nixon Eisenhower and Barbara Walters, among others, to pose in the nude.

Though Flynt is hopeful about having his conviction reversed on appeal, he may be spending time in still other courtrooms. He faces obscenity charges in Cleveland; indictments for sodomy, bribery and disseminating material harmful to juveniles in Cincinnati; and a $10 million breach-of-contract suit from Hustler's former national newsstand distributor. Meanwhile, representatives of the Indianapolis vice squad were at the Cincinnati trial gathering inspiration for their own possible obscenity case against Flynt.

The publisher remains unfazed.

"Obscenity is like the concept of sin--it defies definition," he says. "If we start restricting adult reading habits by what's fit for children, we could be left with only Little Red Riding-Hood. "Says William Shawn, editor of the chaste New Yorker: "This is a very serious threat. In this instance it has to do with taste, but ultimately it has to do with what our attitudes are. In a free society nobody should be the judge."

*A local jury in Wichita, Kans., convicted Screw Magazine Publisher Al Goldstein of obscenity charges (the ruling was set aside because of prosecution misconduct, but he will be retried March 1). In Memphis, Porn Star Harry Reems is appealing an obscenity-conspiracy conviction last year for his role in the movie Deep Throat.

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