H. Louis Sirkin’s motion to dismiss Jennifer Dute’s obscenity charges on the grounds that it was a violation of her privacy rights was denied and as a result Dute is facing a second trial for charges that stem from 2002 and that she has already served seven months in prison for.
A new trial date will be set next month. Last May, an appeals court reversed and remanded Dute’s conviction of pandering obscenity because the presiding judge in the trial case had refused to admit Gangland 17, an interracial video that had been found not to be obscene during the Elyse Metcalf trial, as comparable to the tapes Jennifer 2, 3, 6 and 7, which featured Dute having sex with multiple black partners.
The appeals court also suggested that sentencing guidelines for such a case call for probation, not jail. The appeals court was of the opinion that Dute was jailed and not given probation because of an unfounded belief by the trial court that she had ties to organized crime.
Dute, 33, had served seven months of a one-year sentence handed down by the trial court when the appeal court reversed her conviction.
During her trial, Dute's attorneys argued that she was singled out by law enforcement because she sold her videos on a Web site that ridiculed Hamilton County Sheriff Simon L. Leis, a notorious opponent of First Amendment rights for the past two decades.
Hamilton County Prosecutor Mike Allen is glad Nadel decided to bring the case back to trial.
"It's an important matter," Allen told the Cincinnati Enquirer, "one that should have a final adjudication."
Sirkin told the Enquirer that he expects a new jury to acquit his client. Seeing similar videos in which jurors acquitted the suspect on pandering charges is important to the case, he said.
