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Hustler is tough to beat in court

WWW- Four years ago, city officials in Monroe, Ohio, tried their best to prevent Jimmy Flynt from opening a Hustler Hollywood store near the Interstate 75 and Ohio 63 interchange.

There were letters, e-mail messages and phone calls from angry residents.

City officials cringed and did “everything we could under the current law to prevent him from coming,” said Jay Stewart, development director for Monroe. “He was not welcomed.”

But, facing the threat of a legal fight, the city backed down and allowed Flynt, brother of Hustler publisher Larry Flynt, to open his first store outside of California.

“We knew that, if we had turned him down, he would have sued, and we would have lost,” Stewart said. “Why waste money?”

The pattern has repeated itself in other cities throughout the country: Local governments object to the arrival of a Hustler store, but the Flynts take or threaten legal action. The store usually opens.

That battle is now playing out in Lexington, with a Hustler Hollywood store that opened July 16 near Interstate 75 and Winchester Road. The fight goes before a federal judge this morning, as Jimmy Flynt challenges a zoning ordinance designed to keep X-rated material out of his store.

Phil Burress, president of Citizens for Community Values, battled for years with the Flynts to keep pornography out of Cincinnati. He said their tactics in Lexington are familiar.

“He uses the courts to bully people,” Burress said. “He has a lot of money, and cities throw up their hands and quit — he wins.”

In 1999, Hamilton County, Ohio, prosecutors brought charges against the Flynts for selling inappropriate materials at downtown Cincinnati’s Hustler News and Gifts store. The Flynts were indicted for pandering obscenity, disseminating matter harmful to juveniles, conspiracy and engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity. The charges were dropped in exchange for a guilty plea on two counts of pandering obscenity.

The Flynts agreed not to sell obscene, hard-core merchandise, said Karl Kadon, chief assistant prosecuting attorney for Hamilton County. The store now sells magazines but not hard-core pornographic videos.

Controversy and legal battles have followed the Flynts since the 1970s. They are rarely deterred, and they don’t mind spending thousands in court.

Earlier this week, Larry-Flynt, clad in a black and gold Versace jumpsuit, said he didn’t know how things would turn out in Lexington.

“People think we’ve opened a whorehouse. … They don’t know any better,” he said.

Flynt paused and then shifted in his custom-made gold-plated wheelchair. “We don’t want to keep fighting. We just want to be left alone.”

It wasn’t easy to open the first Hustler Hollywood store in California, Larry Flynt said, because the man who owned the property “refused to sell it to me because of who I am.”

But Flynt wanted the lot, which was on a busy strip on Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood. “I told my financial adviser to buy the store,” Flynt said, chuckling. “He had no idea he actually sold it to me.”

Larry Flynt said the goal of his stores is to make customers feel comfortable.

“I wanted to make it nice so a woman could go into it — like a Gap or Neiman Marcus,” he said.

But opposition still follows wherever a new store is proposed. Occasionally, the opponents succeed.

In September 2002, rumors swirled that Flynt was looking at downtown Indianapolis as a possible site for another Hustler Hollywood store. Steve Campbell, a spokesman for Indianapolis Mayor Bart Peterson, said his city moved “very quickly” to keep the Flynts out of the heart of the city.

It took just two days — rather than weeks — for the council to pass a zoning amendment to keep the store out, Campbell said.

“We were very concerned,” Campbell said. “Not downtown — we did not feel it would be appropriate in that area.”

The Flynts have faced hurdles elsewhere, though they often skip over them.

Last week, the St. Petersburg Times reported that the Fort Lauderdale City Commission failed in an attempt to block Larry Flynt by revamping a zoning ordinance. Flynt had threatened to sue.

The store is now open, and Larry Flynt, 61, will visit Tuesday for a book signing.

Lexington’s fight is in the courts, but the controversy has built for months.

When Jimmy Flynt, 58, opened his Hustler Hollywood store at 2240 Elkhorn Road, city officials and residents hoped he would sell coffee, cheesecake and, at most, cherry-flavored massage oil.

Jimmy Flynt first proposed the store last year, saying it would have a coffee shop with retail sales. But the board of adjustment refused to give him a permit to open with X-rated materials.

His attorneys appealed. In March, the city council approved a zoning amendment to prohibit adult bookstores, video stores, cabarets and adult dancing at interstate interchanges.

Last Friday, Flynt began selling sex toys, X-rated videos and pornographic magazines. He also filed a motion in federal court to block the ban on adult materials near interstates.

On Tuesday, city inspectors gave Flynt 48 hours to “correct” the zoning violation and stop selling pornography. Jimmy-Flynt ignored the order stating, “we’ll be in court.”

Yesterday, the city filed in Fayette District Court a criminal complaint against Flynt’s store for various violations, said Bruce Edwards, Mayor Teresa Isaac’s press secretary. Edwards said the city also filed a motion to dismiss Flynt’s federal lawsuit and allow a state court to handle the matter.

For the past week, Pamula D. Honchell, an opponent of the Hustler store, has been organizing several business owners and residents who want to fight the Flynts.

Honchell said she was happy with the city’s decision to fight in court. Now, she’s “hoping and saying her prayers” that a judge will rule in the city’s favor.

“I’m just hoping for the best,” Honchell said.

So is Jimmy Flynt.

“My attorneys feel confident,” he said.

 

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