Artists Fear Racketeering Prosecution : Law: Anti-obscenity crusaders are now using the far-reaching RICO statute to fuel their cases against pop music and arts targets.

Florida’s raunchy music makers 2 Live Crew and Cincinnati’s Contemporary Art Center may have been cleared of obscenity charges in the last few weeks, but neither the music industry nor the arts community is resting easy.

Neither group is reading the courtroom victories as signs that the effort to clean up the nation’s arts and entertainment is winding down. And many observers see the pressure on artists and performers mounting even more as government on the local, state and federal levels explores new ways to press obscenity cases.

Most ominous, say legal experts and entertainment industry officials, are two recent court decisions that appear to open the door for prosecutions of rap singers and other legitimate artists under the same far-reaching federal anti-racketeering law that has been used to collar and shut down drug pushers, pornography rings, organized crime kingpins and Wall Street market manipulators.

“The crusade to equate hard-core pornography with abstract artistic expression is putting this country’s entire artistic community in jeopardy,” said Mike Greene, president of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. “The implications are immense.”

“Just because 2 Live Crew won this case in Hollywood and the Contemporary Art Center won their Mapplethorpe decision in Cincinnati (last) month,” said Jay Berman, president of the Recording Industry Assn. of America, “I don’t think that’s going to stop any of the crusaders attempting to squelch free expression in America.”

While 2 Live Crew cases continue in courts in Florida, Texas and South Carolina, there is increasing speculation among legal and industry observers that the issue of sexually explicit lyrics in pop music may soon escalate because the FBI and the U.S Justice Department are pressing the use of the 1970 Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act in obscenity cases.

The FBI recently staged obscenity raids on the home of San Francisco photographer Jock Sturges and on 30 Southern California adult video manufacturers and distributors. No charges have been filed in either case.

“My fear is that eventually, some aggressive prosecutor with a fundamentalist bent is bound to go after either a major videotape or record store chain like Music Plus or a book chain like Walden,” said Beverly Hills attorney John Weston. “Maybe even an art museum.”

“All the crusaders need to create a case about obscene music is to have some gung-ho U.S. attorney pose the issue in Washington,” said Norman Abrams, an associate dean and professor of law at UCLA. “Just how far the feds will go with it depends on how energetic the Justice Department is on the obscenity front.”

Justice Department spokesman Doug Tillett dismisses speculation that the federal government will enter the 2 Live Crew matter, but he does acknowledge limited federal prosecutorial interest on the obscenity front.

“In this business, we don’t like to telegraph our punches,” Tillett said. “But while it would be unlikely for us to get involved in the 2 Live Crew case, certain obscene material is clearly not protected.”

The 1970 racketeering act, or RICO as it is commonly called, was originally intended to aid in the fight against the Mafia and other organized crime by targeting “enterprises” that engage in a “pattern of racketeering activity.” But the law has also been used by prosecutors against such diverse targets as the Teamsters Union, former junk-bond king Michael Milken and the late Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos.

And so formidable is RICO’s prosecutorial sweep that potential defendants frequently prefer to cooperate with the government rather than face the threat of a RICO conviction, which, in addition to carrying a 20-year prison term for each racketeering count, can force defendants to forfeit their entire interest in an enterprise, even if only a fraction of earnings came from illegal activities.

That was the choice made by officials of Drexel Burnham Lambert Inc., who pleaded guilty to securities fraud charges that carried a $650-million fine rather than risk the possible loss of billions of dollars in personal and corporate assets under a RICO prosecution.

More than two dozen individual crimes--including murder, arson, obscenity and mail fraud--compose the list of acts considered to be RICO violations. The law allows for civil and criminal prosecution, and under the law a pattern of illegal acts can be established if a defendant commits two offenses within a 10-year period.

On Oct. 10, the Florida Supreme Court ruled that sexually explicit videos, records, books and magazines are not protected by Florida free speech guarantees or the state’s right to privacy provisions--a ruling that reaffirmed the state’s own RICO-based racketeering law empowering prosecutors to shut down enterprises distributing obscene materials. (Twenty-nine other states have laws patterned on the federal RICO statute.)

On Oct. 15, the U.S. Supreme Court let stand the racketeering conviction of a Virginia couple that included the seizure of their three adult bookstores and nine rental shops for selling $105 worth of obscene material.

“Every time one of these obscenity-related RICO convictions is upheld by the court, it encourages prosecutors to broaden the scope of their attack even more,” said attorney Weston, who argued for the defense in the Florida case. “Could a zealous prosecutor use RICO in the Ft. Lauderdale 2 Live Crew case? You bet they could.”

Allen Jacobi, 2 Live Crew’s entertainment attorney, said he thinks that prosecuting the rap group’s Luke Records company under the RICO Act is a far-fetched idea.

“Using RICO to chase after people who distribute records is to stretch the intention of the law into the absurd,” Jacobi said. “The law was written to bring down criminals trafficking in drugs and prostitution, not people selling music. No way. It’ll never happen.”

“In terms of 2 Live Crew, our position is that we believe in the First Amendment,” said the Justice Department’s Tillett. “Yet, let me say this. No matter how remote the chance of prosecution is, we never say never. The door is still open.”

Although the RICO statute has never been used to prosecute a record company or record store owner, an attempt to do so is exactly what ignited the 2 Live Crew controversy in the first place.

Coral Gables anti-porn crusader Jack Thompson initiated the legal furor over 2 Live Crew’s sexually explicit lyrics last January when he asked Florida Gov. Bob Martinez to investigate the possible violation of state obscenity and racketeering statutes regarding the rap group’s best-selling “As Nasty as They Wanna Be” album.

Martinez eventually dropped his investigation, but Thompson has been pleading his case since June for a RICO indictment of 2 Live Crew to the head of the child exploitation and obscenity unit in the Justice Department in Washington.

“You don’t have to wear a black shirt and a white tie and carry around a submachine gun to be a racketeer,” said Thompson. “All the law requires is that you sell two units of obscene material to be considered a racketeer. (2 Live Crew) has sold 2 million.”