"It does not take a very brave man to go out and corner a girl in the middle of spring break who had four drinks," US District Judge Richard Smoak told Joe Francis, producer of "Girls Gone Wild."This statement came yesterday after the company, Mantra Films, INC entered into a guilty plea for failing to create and maintain age and identity documents for performers in sexually explicit films that it produced and distributed, and for failing to label its DVDs and videotapes as required by federal law. Hoover's Inc., a business data firm in Austin, Texas estimates Francis issued 83 titles and sold 4.5 million videos and DVDs in 2002. That's 4.5 million copies of child pornography released into the world.
Judge Smoak ordered Francis to pay fines and restitution totaling $2.1 million and perform 8 hours of community service per month for the next 30 months. That is a wag of the finger to company that hauls in an estimated $40 million in profit each year.
"This case sends an important message about the Justice Department’s commitment to protecting children from all forms of sexual exploitation,” said Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher. “Today’s agreements ensure that Girls Gone Wild will comply with an important law designed to prevent the sexual exploitation of minors and puts other producers on notice that they must be in compliance as well."It's true that this judgement does clearly communicate the level of commitment that the Justice Department has toward protecting childrend from sexual exploitation. The United States Attorney's Office of Northern District of Florida just set a legal precedent for Child Porn industry. The "message," as General Fisher puts it, is a message that Francis and producers like him, can exploit and damage the children in our nation by any means they wish so long as they're willing to pay the state a fine and perform some community service. It's a message to the children that it is not as important to dish out justice to their offenders by placing them in federal prisons as it is to collect a good chunk of money.
Please be outraged at this and share that outrage with people responsible.
United States Attorney's Office
Northern District of Florida
Tallahassee - HQ
111 North Adams Street
Fourth Floor
Tallahassee, FL 32301
850-942-8430
850-942-8896 TDD
Mantra Films, INC
Retail Sales:
Tom Schon, V.P., Sales
thomass@mantraent.com
GGW Video
Attn: Dept. of Evil Product Development
PO Box 150
Hollywood, CA 90078
Black's Law Dictionary: Deluxe Thumb-Index (Black's Law Dictionary)
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