Forget about porn going mainstream on the coasts, the Dallas Observer says Debbie may have done Dallas but Dallas will do in porn as fast as the city's 24-member vice squad can make the busts.
Just ask Forbidden Books owner Jason Cohen. He faces a misdemeanor obscenity charge for selling a hardcore video at his store over the summer. You can also ask a bigger fish - Tower Records, whose Dallas outlet was hit by an obscenity charge against a clerk who sold an adult tape - though the store itself was not charged.
Tower has stood by its man so far, the Observer says. The Sacramento, CA-based chain - whose California stores often feature in-person signings by adult stars - struck a deal with the Dallas County district attorney in which the Dallas store stopped stocking XXX tapes in return for the case against the clerk being dropped.
"I don't know if they want me to stop selling [hardcore tapes] or what," the store's manager tells the Observer. "It's a huge First Amendment issue. It worries me that the city is gonna come in and tell me what is and what is not obscene. Where does it stop? Who is to say what is and what isn't on the list?"
