Dallas Jury Convicts Local X-Rated Video Distributor

A federal court jury in Dallas has convicted a California distributor of X-rated videos and five other defendants of shipping obscene cassettes to Dallas in 1989. The 12 jurors acquitted one defendant and could not reach a verdict on four of the seven counts against each of the others.

The jury must still decide whether the distributor, California Publishers Liquidating Corp., should forfeit millions of dollars in assets that were seized by federal authorities after an 18-month undercover investigation. U.S. District Judge Barefoot Sanders then will decide how much of the confiscated property, including the distributor’s headquarters in downtown Los Angeles, should be turned over to the government.

The jury found California Publishers, Video Team Inc., Investment Enterprises Inc. and three officers of the companies, Donald P. Browning, Michael Warner and Susan C. Colvin, guilty of conspiring to distribute obscene videos to Dallas. Defendant Christian Mann was acquitted.