from www.cincinnati.com – In the most recent salvo of a family feud, Jimmy Flynt wants the partnership with his brother, Hustler publisher Larry Flynt, ended, as well as half of the porn empire’s assets.
That includes the Hustler stores Downtown and in Monroe, both “on paper” in Jimmy Flynt’s name.
Jimmy Flynt filed a 61-page suit Thursday in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court, accusing his brother of wrongfully firing him and improperly taking millions in company profits from him.
It’s the latest in a series of suits and slams the Flynts have been launching at each other.
The rift started when Jimmy Flynt’s sons, Jimmy II and Dustin, were fired from the family business by Larry Flynt. They then started their own porn business and called it Flynt Media Corp. That, Larry Flynt alleged in federal court, violated his trademark and hurt and devalued his business. A federal court jury agreed last week. His nephews were ordered to put their first names on their company and products.
Larry Flynt, upset that his nephews tried to capitalize on his name and that Jimmy Flynt couldn’t control his sons, fired Jimmy – whose annual salary was $250,000 – and is trying to cut him out of the family business, the suit states.
The suit alleges Jimmy and Larry Flynt had a partnership of more than 40 years with both brothers contributing – with money and hard work – to build the Flynt empire that includes magazines, retail stores and other businesses across the United States and 50 countries.
“But for Jimmy’s ideas, labor, talents, energies, contributions, loyalty and trust, Jimmy and Larry’s partnership and business enterprise never would have achieved the success or growth that it has and very likely would not exist today,” the suit notes.
The Hustler clubs that launched the Flynt empire were legally owned by Jimmy Flynt, the suit notes. Profits from those clubs were used to start Hustler magazine and pay for nude photos of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis that, when published in the magazine, earned it more than $1 million and provided money to build the resulting Flynt businesses.
“But for Jimmy’s actions, Hustler most likely would have ceased to exist in the late 1970s or early 1980s during a period of time when Larry was physically and/or mentally incapacitated,” the suit adds.
In addition to the infamous obscenity trial in Hamilton County in 1976-77, Larry Flynt was shot in 1978 and became a paraplegic.
The suit notes what it calls Larry Flynt’s mental illness and cites several incidents of it including the time he appeared in federal court wearing a U.S. flag as a diaper. During that turmoil and Larry Flynt’s federal prison term, Jimmy Flynt ran the company, it adds.
Larry Flynt didn’t return calls Friday.
The vast majority of the company’s profits were placed back into the company and Jimmy Flynt didn’t amass the fortune his brother did, the suit notes. Despite that, Jimmy Flynt helped the company diversify in the past two decades by working to develop its retail business.
The Monroe superstore was so profitable that Larry Flynt insisted it sign a licensing agreement with his company – at $65,000 per month – so he could put those profits in his coffers.
In the last year, the suit alleges, Larry Flynt has fired his brother, cut off his medical and retirement benefits and done all he can to take as much money from the Hustler-related business in Jimmy Flynt’s name.
As a result, Jimmy Flynt’s seek suits to have a receiver review the assets of all of the Hustler companies to determine their value. It seeks to have the brothers’ partnership dissolved and for Jimmy Flynt to get at least half of those assets.