Porn Found On L.A. Obscenity Case Judge's Website 393
Stanislav_J writes "In a bizarre revelation, the judge who is presiding over the Isaacs obscenity trial in Los Angeles was found to have sexually explicit material on a publicly-accessible website. Alex Kozinski, chief judge of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, acknowledged that he had posted the materials, but says he believed the site to be for personal storage only, and not accessible to the public (though he does acknowledge sharing some of the material with friends). The files included images of masturbation, public sex, contortionist sex, a transsexual striptease, a photo of naked women on all fours painted to look like cows, and a video of a half-dressed man cavorting with a sexually aroused farm animal. The latter two are especially ironic in that the trial involves the distribution of allegedly obscene sexual fetish videos depicting bestiality, among other things, by Ira Isaacs, an L.A. filmmaker."
Stanislav_J continues:
"The judge has blocked public access to the site (putting up a graphic that reads, 'Ain't nothin' here — y'all best be movin' on, compadre').Isaacs' defense had welcomed the assignment of Kozinski to the case because of his long record of defending the First Amendment, but the startling news about his website (the revelation of which seems to have been interestingly timed to coincide with today's scheduled opening arguments) now have many folks calling for him to be removed from the case. There is no indication that any of the images on Kozinski's site would be considered obscene or illegal. But certainly, one has to believe that most would consider this at the very least to represent a serious conflict of interest given the nature of the trial."
The Ninth Circus Court (Score:5, Funny)
Animals. (Score:5, Insightful)
The ninth circuit is about to lose a defender of free speech because he had the savvy to run a web site but not enough to know how it really works. His collection of "porn" are things that other people sent him, the kind of crap that clogs email systems everywhere. It is impossible to have an email address and not have it sent to you. Someone you know will send it along. His mistake was putting it where it could be seen by the same kinds of fanatics that are pushing the "war on porn" in the first place. Ignore the fact that they routinely get busted like Jimmy Swaggart did. Kozinski thought people would not find it because there was no link to the directory ... ugh! He's exactly the kind of level headed person the courts need to rule fairly on these kinds of cases.
Like the fine article quotes him saying [latimes.com]:
Those were fine sentiments when he was appointed by Ronald Reagan, but it's bad news under a regime that wants to be above the law. There you will find your animals, those who want to live by tooth and claw.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I've never, ever, ever had anything like that sent to any of the 9 e-mail addresses I use for home, work, or family communication. Ever.
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Funny)
You don't know enough Republicans.
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Funny)
Can't you post some links or something?
I'd post my email address, but I'm worried that people might fill up my inbox with something other than beastiality porn.
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Interesting)
Said principal used a Mac, while the school was primarily PC-based. They seized his computer, and returned it over a month later, claiming that they'd found porn (and releasing some supposedly-recovered photos).
I did a full analysis -- wrote my own tools to analyze HFS+, scanned the raw disk for image headers, etc -- and found (1) that the system had files and directories with mtimes during the period in which it was in the district's possession (and thus that they'd failed to follow accepted digital forensics practices), (2) that there were in fact a small number of pornographic images on the hard drive... and (3) that every one of those images was autodownloaded by Eudora Pro, a mail client (written back before spam was a serious issue) which saved every attachment to a specific folder on the disk without prompting. However, not one of these images matched those the school district claimed to have recovered.
The district dropped their case -- and "promoted" the principal to an administrative position he hated, working directly under the man who tried to fire him. Sigh.
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Animals. (Score:5, Funny)
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There are easier ways to get free porn than to post on slashdot and get lots of goatse or who knows what.
So following your example, I've never had anyone send me money out of the blue to my paypal account.
Re:Animals. (Score:4, Funny)
I've never had anyone send me money out of the blue to my paypal account.
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Re:Animals. (Score:5, Funny)
Well, I guess I'm a prude!
I came here hoping someone would post a link to a woman painted like a cow on all fours.
Until I heard about it I had no desire to see this... but now I must.. and I will not rest until I see this bovine sirine. Her tempting moo-call beckons me!
Oh.. and yes, you're a fuckin prude.
FOUND THE PIC (Score:3, Funny)
This is the picture you want. [hame.ca] It is almost certainly the pic on the judge's computer. Two women on all fours, body-painted like cows. They are completely nude and the camera angle is from behind, so it's extremely NSFW.
And while I'm at it, pictures one [magyver.com] and two [erosblog.com] of individual nude women pained like cows. I suspect the bodyart in all three pics is from a single artist (notice the distinctive black collar on the wrists/ankles/neck, the bare
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Insightful)
I fail to see the story here at all, and I think the comments in this thread up to this post miss the point.
The point: why should a judge recuse himself from a case due to a supposed conflict of interest when there really is no conflict of interest? Judges are, by definition, asked to compartmentalize their professional opinions and personal opinions, so when the law or a judge's interpretation of the law is in conflict with their personal stance, that is business as usual. We still expect them to rule based on a valid interpretation of the law...regardless of what they think the law ought to be.
A conflict of interest only arises when the judge-in-question has a personal and relevant involvement in the particular proceeding at hand. For example, if the judge regularly does business with a contractor and that contractor comes into his courtroom as a party to a lawsuit, depending on the nature of their relationship, it might be appropriate for the judge to recuse himself. If the judge has financial dealings with anyone involved in a case, then even the appearance of impropriety should be avoided.
However, to say that any judge that's viewed porn should not be able to rule in pornography cases is kind of stupid (even if it's fetish porn). Actually, even if it's child porn, there's no conflict of interest—rather, the commission of a felony is grounds for having that judge removed from the bench, but it wouldn't be a conflict of interest any more than a judge who's an alcoholic ruling on a drunk driving case.
So there's just no conflict of interest here. If we say there is, we have to accept that any judge who's had or had a significant other that's had an abortion cannot rule on abortion cases. And we also have to accept that any judge that's refused to have or be party to an abortion cannot rule on abortion cases. Basically, we're saying that they cannot have taken a position on anything in their personal lives if they're to form a legal interpretation on that thing from the bench. Stupid.
Re:Animals. (Score:5, Insightful)
So there's just no conflict of interest here. If we say there is, we have to accept that any judge who's had or had a significant other that's had an abortion cannot rule on abortion cases. And we also have to accept that any judge that's refused to have or be party to an abortion cannot rule on abortion cases. Basically, we're saying that they cannot have taken a position on anything in their personal lives if they're to form a legal interpretation on that thing from the bench. Stupid.
Now, if this particular porn happened to come from the defendant in this case, then I could see a possible grounds for viewing it as a conflict of interest. If it is specifically from the material that the defendant is in trouble for distributing, then it probably is a conflict of interest. But from my reading, it's just random mostly-unrelated porn.
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Re:The Ninth Circus Court (Score:5, Funny)
(Ducking behind a cow painted to look like a woman in a blue silk dress.)
Re:The Ninth Circus Court (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The Ninth Circus Court (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The Ninth Circus Court (Score:4, Funny)
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Basically what I'm saying is that Kozinski is a superstar in the legal community. This is why it's truly funny. It's p
Heh (Score:2)
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If the models are all of legal age, then the worst thing you can really accuse him of is copyright infringement.
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One could make the argument that a judge that refused to ever look at porn in their life is equally biased and should recuse themselves.
If anything, I think this makes him more likely to be able to be impartial.
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But, reading further into "storage and distribution"...he failed... unless of course, he was sharing it with other judges, but I think that "isnt in the book" as far as I know, a Judge isnt supposed to take advice from other Judges in a case (
If was up for such charges... (Score:5, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Foresight, perhaps (Score:4, Insightful)
Where does the article even imply the judge is going to be criminally prosecuted for the content that was on his website? From the description, the content on his site may be seen as embarrassing and in poor taste, but you have to do far more than post nudie pictures your site to be brought up on obscenity charges.
By your logic, a judge who drinks and enjoys alcoholic beverages must recuse himself from a DUI trial because of conflict of interest.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
In this case, the judge is being asked, in the courtcase, to define a similar limit about obscenity. Arguably, at least some of the images & video he
Hyperlink us FTW! (Score:5, Funny)
- David Stein
"Eh" (Score:5, Funny)
Don't get too titillated now
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Re:"Eh" (Score:5, Funny)
RTFS (Score:2)
huh? (Score:4, Funny)
*blink*
*blinkblink*
*blink*
What?
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Re:huh? (Score:5, Funny)
Thank you. Thank you. I'll be hear all week. Try the veal!
Re:huh? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:huh? (Score:5, Funny)
Just be careful not to milk this joke for too long...
What are you talking about? We'll be milking this joke until the cows come home.
Re:huh? (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
safesearch off
2nd image result
http://images.google.com/images?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&=&q=cow%20girl
Today's important legal lesson for budding Judges (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Today's important legal lesson for budding Judg (Score:2, Insightful)
reaction of the community (Score:5, Insightful)
"his long record of defending the First Amendment" was not mentioned.
Where is the irony? I do not see it. Porn-loving judge defends "first amendment". I would call it "integrity".
The wolf was appointed to herd the sheep. Call me back when man bites dog.
Re:reaction of the community (Score:5, Funny)
Oh boy (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Oh boy (Score:5, Funny)
Is there something wrong with enjoying your work?
What better way... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:What better way... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What better way... (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't see the line when you produce the item. You can't see the line when you're charged. You can only see the line you crossed when the jury reads the verdict. And then you go to jail, period.
Amazing, considering "obscenity" as a form of expression doesn't even hurt anyone. It's just a straight-up 1st Amendment violation.
Good Lawyering That... (Score:2)
First time in history (Score:5, Funny)
Car analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
Should a judge also recuse himself from presiding over auto theft cases if he should happen like cars?
Does liking porn predispose him to favoring the defendant in an illegal porn case? More importantly, does it do so to a greater degree than being a defender of the First Amendment?
Re:Car analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
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So What (Score:5, Insightful)
What conflict of interest? (Score:5, Insightful)
What would be the 'right' judge to preside over this case? A known prude who prays to God at least seven times a week and has publically stated that pornography is a sin?
So he has a life outside the court room. Big fucking deal. There's no money involved in it for him, I'm sure, and he probably doesn't know the defendant either. Where is the conflict of interest?!
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Just an FYI for future dates.
Slashdotted, darn it! (Score:5, Informative)
The good news: it's in the Wayback machine. [archive.org]
The bad news: the Wayback machine just shows "Ain't nothin' here. Y'all best be movin' on, compadre" on the main page, from 2004 through the last snapshot in 2005. (The news story saying that this is a recent change is apparently wrong).
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
http://web.archive.org/web/*hh_/alex.kozinski.com/underneathmyrobe/
Although, these are
http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://alex.kozinski.com/underneathmyrobe/datinggame.rm
http://web.archive.org/web/*hh_/alex.kozinski.com/stuff/jump.avi
and this
http://alex.kozinski.com/jurist-l/
was blocked from the archive
http://web.archive.org/web/*hh_/alex.kozinski.com/robots.txt
That said, after digging throught the site, it looks like:
A. He's actually human, and has a life outside being a judge (sho
Have you seen this? (Score:5, Insightful)
At the bare minimum I would suggest the material in question makes him much more applicable to judge a case involving bestiality because he should be able to recognize the difference between protected speech and images (those emails classify as such) and obscene material.
And now the punchline... (Score:3, Funny)
Define "obscene". (Score:3, Insightful)
P.S. Before you judge my own sexual desires and fetishes, I ask you to let it go and ask yourself if it's even necessary. It's not my point to try and "legalize" beastiality or anything of the sort - I just think it's kind of lame to try and tell someone what is "ok" sexually, and what isn't (as long as nobody/nothing gets hurt or is forced to do something against their will - that's a completely different story). It reminds me of the "old days" when certain sex positions were illegal.
Lets all pretend that we dont have sexual thoughts (Score:3, Funny)
Oh yeah... and dont forget... We do not wipe our own asses... that is dirty.
Obscenity wtf (Score:3, Interesting)
Seriously, I get offended when people back off and hide things or pause to hold back words in the middle of a sentence while they do a quick replacement. I never say anything because it's futile and the world is a threatening place in that context anyway.
I once knew a girl that could curse really well. Like, she didn't hold shit back, she didn't throw "fuck" or "ass" or "shit" in every third word; but when she had something to say, she threw every emphasis in right where it belongs, actually using those words as intensifiers, creating interesting and amusing combination and even in some cases short streams of nonsense that still conveyed the proper emotion. It's like someone actually turned streams of obscenities into a fine art; I've never seen anyone else communicate so comfortably or so clearly.
We live in a world where sending an e-mail to your boss stating you "don't know what's wrong yet because there's too much shit to wade through" can instantly get you fired. We just use euphamisms to indicate obscene concepts rather than single "obscene" words. The concept of isolated obscenity is obscene; preventing people from sharing shit you don't like is an aberration and we should be ashamed as a people for supporting this sort of behavior.
Judge must have pretty good influence (Score:3, Interesting)
Ain't nothin' here.
Y'all best be movin' on, compadre.
so....... isn't this like..... (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course not. Only if the judge's website had illegal porn should he be considered to have a conflict of interest.
Here ya go!! (Score:5, Informative)
Cryptome posted a Yahoo cache of Kozinski's directory [cryptome.org] on its site.
Some of the more interesting file names include:
a.day.without.jews.wmv
BBCCopsUndies.wmv
Colo-rectalSurgeon.wav
isitmanisitwoman.pps
jewsdontcamp.mp3
piss_diver.wmv
Sheep_guy.jpg
show.them.to.me.wmv
testicle.interview.wmv
Looks like Jewish groups may not appreciate his sense of humor as well as the anti-porn crowd. At any rate, I don't see much of anything there that looks from the file names alone to be hardcore. It really does look like a directory of miscellaneous stuff that came in "Look at this!" and "Check THIS out!" e-mails from friends that he just stored on the site for easy access.
Re:Here ya go!! (Score:5, Informative)
UPDATE (Score:3, Informative)
In an updated version of the story, the L.A. Times now reporting that the trial has been suspended:
Alex Kozinski, chief judge of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, granted a 48-hour stay in the obscenity trial of a Hollywood adult filmmaker after the prosecutor requested time to explore "a potential conflict of interest concerning the court having a . . . sexually explicit website with similar material to what is on trial here."
One new wrinkle is that the good judge is at least partially trying to shift blame to his own son!
After publication of an latimes.com article about his website Wednesday morning, the judge offered another explanation for how the material might have been posted to the site. Tuesday evening he had told The Times that he had a clear recollection of some of the most objectionable material and that he was responsible for placing it on the Web. By Wednesday afternoon, as controversy about the website spread, Kozinski was seeking to shift responsibility, at least in part, to his adult son, Yale. ["Yale??"]
"Yale called and said he's pretty sure he uploaded a bunch of it," Kozinski wrote in an e-mail to Abovethelaw.com, a legal news website. "I had no idea, but that sounds right because I sure don't remember putting some of that stuff there."
Or maybe it was one of his brothers, Harvard and Princeton....
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Not ironic (Score:2)
Irony implies you wouldn't expect judges to have midget transexual transpecie gay porn.
Re:Can you say (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Can you say (Score:5, Funny)
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I mostly agree, except for judges as moral compasses. Morals and laws are very different things.
Laws are meant to prevent a person from infringing another person's rights. Morals are meant to tell a person what's right or wrong. The confusion comes from all the situations where the two overlap, such as murder, rape, robbery, and fraud.
I would expect a judge to be lawful. I wouldn't necessarily expect them to agree with my morals.
Re:Ignorance is no defense... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Well then...
Contributing to the delinquency of minors, and whatever statutes cover providing pornography to minors as well.
Re:Ignorance is no defense... (Score:5, Insightful)
IE: A guy is walking down a street.
Well really the example doesn't lend itself to any laws being broken but here are the responses you'd get anyways.
1 - Maybe he is walking IN the street in which case he is Jaywalking
2 - He also might be obstructing traffic
3 - If he isn't wearing any clothes then he might be arrested for public indecency
I could go on but I won't.
Except Nowadays... (Score:3, Insightful)
We have IIRC over 40,000 Federal felony statutes, and hundreds of thousands of regulations. Combine that with prosecutors and cops who take an "expansive view" of the definitions of the words in the code and someone committed a felony last night in their sleep.
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I'll let you do the counting, but the majority of the felonies in the federal system are in Title 18.
Maybe if you consider all the different combinations of specifications and amounts, etc. as different offense you might get to 40,000, but otherwise, I have a feeling it's nowhere close to that.
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Actually I would say if it fails the Miller Test and he was publicly distributing it he should be charged like anyone else. I have not seen the pictures, but I think it feasible to launch an investigation as to whether or not he broke the law with pictures that possibly do not pass a Miller Test. Remember ignorance is not a valid excuse for breaking the law.
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IANAL... but that said, AFAIK:
Ignorance *of the law* is not a valid excuse for breaking it. I doubt he was ignorant of the law. Ignorance of the ramifications of your actions is a variety of excuse. It still leaves you open to anything that is negligence related (I won't even try to speculate as to his potential degree of exposure in that realm). A very large number of statutes have the words 'knowingly and willingly' or other words to that e
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Y'know... every time I come across the acronym IANAL, I have the same thought. It's particularly apt in a thread about pornography.
Re:Ignorance is no defense... (Score:4, Interesting)
Probably.
Doesn't sound like it. Not that it matters. Not even commercial* porn providers require age verification.
The only major problem with that is, you'd have to actually show (a) the actual minors whose delinquency was contributed to (the "making available" argument doesn't fly) and (b) almost certainly show there was good reason to believe that the judge new he was distributing said content to minors (otherwise most porn mags would be shut down, since obviously if the porn mags weren't printed, you couldn't find minors with them).
In short, you have to consider the judge's position as if he were any other major publisher. Given the repeated attempts to try to "protect" minors on the internet in the past involving porn and how few laws have stood up to Constitutional scrutiny (the only one that comes to mind as accepted is ones involving libraries accpeting federal funds in exchange for having to include anti-porn filters; and assumedly that has to do with it being voluntary to accept funds), it just doesn't seem likely that yet another contorted attempt would work. But, obviously, it's all a matter of taking the judge to court and spending several years until the Supreme Court decides.
*Commercial in this context doesn't just mean "and we want your credit card number". The second one starts receiving money as a result of ads on one's website, one can be called commercial (just like broadcast TV). Assumedly this was a major reason that the age verification laws were discarded, as it would be very unreasonable to have every last website showing a nipple with an ad on it to request a credit card number. And odds are, most people *wouldn't* give a credit card number to the site. The last part, then, severely cripples freedom of speech by abridging the legitimate right of the vast majority to access a site without undue burden. Now, if there were some way to age verify someone in a more trivial fashion on the internet, the courts would probably have a much different interpretation on things.
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So, I see that not one amongst our libertarian crowd has yet taken you to task for your kmee-jerk 'think of the blinkin' children' response. Perhaps because they know better than to feed the stinkin' trolls. Regardless, I'm just dumb enough to bite.
Here goes: Are you frackin' stupid? It's illegal to show someone speeding? Or running a red light? It's illegal to show OJ failing to pull over? Or t
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Is it a market if the distribution is free, as in this case? And as for the rest, it's thought crime, entirely conjectural "may discover", etc.,
Re:psychologically (Score:5, Insightful)
Every day, Joe, a construction worker, would walk to his job singing dirty songs. Mrs. Williams finally got fed up and complained to the police about Joe's singing. They told Joe to cut out the singing. The next day, Mrs. Williams complained again. They asked Joe, and he had stopped singing. So they asked her what the problem was. "He's whistling dirty songs now."
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Re:No big surprise (Score:4, Informative)
Your lawyer buddies probably also know that Judge Kozinski tends to be conservative/libertarian, not "liberal" (as the court is often characterized), and is a highly respect jurist. I'm not defending him or his actions, but I'm saying that dismissing an entire court due to some stupid belief is just
Re:No big surprise (Score:5, Informative)
For every case the Supreme Court hears, how many do they allow to stand?-- http://mediamatters.org/items/200511090012 [mediamatters.org]
If 16 of 19 cases that were taken were overturned in 04/05, how many cases did the Supreme Court decline to hear, allowing the 9th Circuit decision to stand? I can't find statistics on the numbers of appeals where the Supreme Court essentially "agreed" with the Circuit court, but I did find this neat doohickey [uscourts.gov] that lets me generate reports on case information for each Circuit, and it tells me that for 2005, the number of "on the merits" decisions (as opposed to decisions about procedural error, etc) was:
1st) 986
2nd) 2121
3rd) 2329
4th) 2590
5th) 3608
6th) 2903
7th) 1480
8th) 2078
9th) 6197
10th) 1524
11th) 3579
DCth
If every one of those 6197 decisions was appealed and the Supreme Court only disagreed 16 times, that's a pretty damn good percentage in my opinion.
Finally, California has money out the wazoo. That money is required in order to appeal cases in the first place, and doubly so to appeal to the Supreme Court. Coupled with the fact that the government is more or less required to let the people try to appeal (something about a right to petition for redress of grievances), you can see those dollars at work in this Circuit.