Gordon Lee (comic store owner)

Last updated
Gordon Lee
Born(1958-10-20)October 20, 1958[ citation needed ]
DiedJanuary 13, 2013(2013-01-13) (aged 54)
OccupationComic store owner
Known forInvolvement in obscenity case involving comic books

Gordon Lee (died January 13, 2013) was an American comic book store owner from Rome, Georgia, who is most famous for having been charged with distributing obscene material to a minor in connection with the Free Comic Book Day on Halloween, 2004. The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund was heavily involved in Lee's defense. Lee was previously convicted on another obscenity charge.

Contents

1994 obscenity conviction

Gordon Lee was the owner of the comic book store Legends, which was based in Rome, Georgia. [1] Lee was convicted on February 18, 1993 of "distributing obscene materials" for selling the pornographic comics Final Taboo and Debbie Does Dallas to adult customers. He was fined $1,000 and sentenced to 12 months; both were suspended on payment of $250. Lee made appeals to the court, but they were denied by the Georgia Court of Appeals and Georgia Supreme Court in 1994. The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund assisted with fees for the trial and the appeal. [2] [3] [4]

On September 3, 1993, Lee filed suit for the return of inventory seized in conjunction with the obscenity case. The comics seizure had occurred on November 1, 1991, the day the police received a complaint about comics that were purchased at Legends. Around 300 books were taken as evidence under a search warrant, but were not returned until July 29, 1994, when the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia issued a ruling ordering the district attorney to return the inventory within ten days. [2]

Charged with selling to a minor

Lee entered the news again after the Halloween 2004 Free Comic Book Day giveaway at a street fair in Rome. [5] Lee's shop gave away thousands of free comics on that day, but a copy of Alternative Comics #2 was unintentionally included in the giveaway. [6]

Alternative Comics #2 is an anthology containing an excerpt from the story The Salon by Nick Bertozzi. [7] [8] The story portrays Pablo Picasso's first meeting with the fellow cubist Georges Braque, during which Picasso is depicted as nude in a non-sexual context. (The CBLDF has made statements that the comic is historically accurate in this depiction.) [1] [6]

The copy of that comic that was unintentionally given away was handed to a minor, whose parent filed a complaint with the police. Upon learning of the error, Lee admitted that a mistake was made and offered to make a public apology for the first of many times. That apology was rejected, and days later, Lee was arrested. [6] The minor in question was originally described as a nine-year-old boy, but various accounts by the District Attorney's office later stated that the comic was given either to the boy's six-year-old brother or to both boys. [5]

Lee later stated "Though I am willing to apologize for this particular art book getting in the hands that found it offensive, I will adamantly agree that the book is not 'harmful to children' or 'obscene.' In my opinion, this book is no more offensive then viewing the beautiful paintings of the Sistine Chapel or reading one of the best selling books with stories of sex, lust and nudity known as the Bible." [9]

District Attorney Leigh Patterson charged Lee with two felony counts and five misdemeanors. The two felony charges were brought under the Distribution of Material Depicting Nudity or Sexual Conduct law, which requires materials containing nudity to be distributed in a labelled envelope. Penalties for violating this law include one to three years in prison and/or fines of up to $10,000 US. The five misdemeanors were presented under the Distribution of Material Harmful to Minors law, which makes it a misdemeanor to supply minors any material containing nudity. [5] [7]

CBLDF involvement

Lee approached Comic Book Legal Defense Fund board member Peter David for help late in January 2005. The CBLDF Board of Directors voted unanimously to financially support Lee's defense, putting a defense team in place within days. [6] [9]

In May 2005, the CBLDF submitted four motions to dismiss the counts Lee faced, challenging the constitutionality of both laws. A hearing on those motions was held on December 1, 2005, during which all charges under the Distribution of Material Depicting Nudity or Sexual Conduct law were dropped. Two of the remaining misdemeanor charges were dropped as well, and the three remaining charges were consolidated into only two. The remaining charges were for "distributing a book, pamphlet, magazine, and printed matter containing pictures, drawings and visual representation and images of a person a portion of the human body which depict sexually explicit nudity, sexual conduct, and sadomasochistic abuse and which is harmful to minors;" and for knowingly furnishing and disseminating to a minor materials "containing explicit and detailed verbal descriptions and narrative accounts of sexual excitement, sexual conduct, and sadomasochistic abuse and which taken as a whole is harmful to minors." The Fund maintained that the material did not meet the criteria as charged. [6]

Delays in the trial

By November 2007, the CBLDF had spent over $80,000 on Lee's defense after taking the case in early 2005, and estimated costs reaching six figures by the end of the trial. The case has been ready for trial three times, but has been delayed each time. [8]

Re-filing of charges

On April 2, 2006, 18 hours before Lee's jury trial, the District Attorney's team informed the defense team that all charges were being dropped against Lee based on a mistake: The recipient of the comic was not the nine-year-old originally referenced in the charges; it was his six-year-old brother. The same charges were immediately re-filed, but with the child listed. The defense team expressed shock at this statement, which meant the case (and defense preparations for it) had been proceeding for 18 months under faulty charges. Also, the prosecutor's admission meant that false testimony had been presented under oath at the pre-trial hearing. Lead counsel Alan Begner protested "How did a year and a half of statements based on one set of facts get changed at the last minute to another set of facts?" [5] [6]

New arraignment and additional delays

On May 19, 2006, a new arraignment was held, again charging the same two misdemeanors; this time both the six-year-old and nine-year-old boys were cited as victims. The CBLDF filed several procedural motions and motions to dismiss on May 30. The motions included allegations of prosecutorial misconduct in connection with what were now characterized as false allegations, as well as allegations of the District Attorney's office allowing untruthful testimony to be presented under oath, causing Lee and his defense counsel to incur unnecessary expense by requiring a change in trial date on too-short notice. Patterson said that her office had "been honest and above board throughout this case. We forwarded new information to the defense as quickly as we got it." [6] [10]

On June 2, 2006, prosecutors filed yet another new indictment, modifying the second misdemeanor charge. This marked the third time Lee had been formally charged for this one incident. Although new indictments were issued, the first two sets of charges were never formally dropped. The CBLDF team again filed motions, this time in response to all three sets of accusations, but they were all dismissed, including those alleging prosecutorial misconduct. [6]

The trial was postponed again on August 15, 2007, due to the illness of presiding Judge Larry Salmon. [11]

Mistrial

Opening statements in the new trial began on November 5, 2007, but quickly resulted in a mistrial. Prior to the opening statements, the defense requested that the judge bar prosecutors from commenting on Lee's previous conviction in 1994. However, the prosecution noted in opening statements that Lee told deputies during the 2004 incident he had "been through this before and beat it". The district attorney's office planned to bring the case back to Floyd Superior Court the following year. [1] At this point, the CBLDF had spent over $80,000 on Lee's defense. [8]

Case dismissed

On Friday, 18 April 2008, it was announced in author Neil Gaiman's blog that the case had been dismissed. [12]

Effects of the case

The charges against Lee have unnerved many shop owners who are concerned about distributing materials that could result in similar charges. One store owner in Georgia stated that "We are a smaller community, very similar to the community that Gordon is in. We will special order [controversial comic Lost Girls ] for anybody, but we will not have it out on display." [5]

Later life and death

Lee entered the news for unrelated reasons when he chased two women who have since been charged with stealing two puzzles based on the movie The Nightmare Before Christmas from his store. In an attempt to stop the women, Lee jumped on the hood of their car, and was thrown off, unhurt, after riding on the hood for a block. The women were later charged with shoplifting, and the driver was charged with aggravated assault. [13]

Lee died on the afternoon of January 13, 2013, from complications stemming from a series of strokes. He was 54 years old. [14]

Related Research Articles

In United States law, a motion is a procedural device to bring a limited, contested issue before a court for decision. It is a request to the judge to make a decision about the case. Motions may be made at any point in administrative, criminal or civil proceedings, although that right is regulated by court rules which vary from place to place. The party requesting the motion may be called the moving party, or may simply be the movant. The party opposing the motion is the nonmoving party or nonmovant.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Comic Book Legal Defense Fund</span> American nonprofit

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund (CBLDF) is an American non-profit organization formed in 1986 to protect the First Amendment rights of comics creators, publishers, and retailers covering legal expenses. Charles Brownstein served as the organization's executive director from 2002 until his resignation in 2020.

Castillo v. Texas, 79 S.W. 3d 817 was a controversial Texan court decision in which Jesus Castillo, an employee of a comic book store in Dallas, Texas, was charged with two counts of "display of obscenity", and convicted for one, after selling adult comics to an adult.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mike Diana</span> The first cartoonist to be convicted of obscenity in the United States.

Michael Christopher Diana is an American underground cartoonist. His work, which is largely self-published, deals with themes including sexuality, violence, and religion. He is the first person to receive a criminal conviction in the United States for artistic obscenity for his comic Boiled Angel.

A criminal charge is a formal accusation made by a governmental authority asserting that somebody has committed a crime. A charging document, which contains one or more criminal charges or counts, can take several forms, including:

A criminal defense lawyer is a lawyer specializing in the defense of individuals and companies charged with criminal activity. Some criminal defense lawyers are privately retained, while others are employed by the various jurisdictions with criminal courts for appointment to represent indigent persons; the latter are generally called public defenders. The terminology is imprecise because each jurisdiction may have different practices with various levels of input from country to country. Some jurisdictions use a rotating system of appointments, with judges appointing a private practice attorney or firm for each case.

The Barry Bonds perjury case was a case of alleged perjury regarding use of anabolic steroids by former San Francisco Giants outfielder and all-time Major League Baseball (MLB) career home run leader, Barry Bonds, and the related investigations surrounding these accusations. On April 13, 2011, Bonds was convicted of one felony count of obstruction of justice for giving an incomplete answer to a question in grand jury testimony. A mistrial was declared on the remaining three counts of perjury, and those charges were dropped. The obstruction of justice conviction was upheld by an appellate panel in 2013, but a larger panel of the appellate court overturned the conviction in 2015.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wisconsin circuit courts</span>

The Wisconsin circuit courts are the general trial courts in the state of Wisconsin. There are currently 69 circuits in the state, divided into 10 judicial administrative districts. Circuit court judges hear and decide both civil and criminal cases. Each of the 249 circuit court judges are elected and serve six-year terms.

The sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia, in Pennsylvania, U.S., is a significant episode in the series of Catholic sex abuse cases in the United States, Ireland and elsewhere. The Philadelphia abuses were substantially revealed through a grand jury investigation in 2005. In early 2011, a new grand jury reported extensive new charges of abusive priests active in the archdiocese. In 2012, a guilty plea by priest Edward Avery and the related trial and conviction of William Lynn and mistrial on charges against James J. Brennan followed from the grand jury's investigations. In 2013, Charles Engelhardt and teacher Bernard Shero were tried, convicted and sentenced to prison. Lynn was the first official to be convicted in the United States of covering up abuses by other priests in his charge and other senior church officials have been extensively criticized for their management of the issue in the archdiocese.

<i>The Salon</i> (comics) Graphic novel by Nick Bertozzi

The Salon is a graphic novel written and illustrated by Nick Bertozzi. Originally published in installments on the website Serializer.net in 2002, it was eventually published in its entirety by St. Martin's Press in April 2007.

Norman H. McAllister is an American politician who was a member of the Vermont Senate. He represented the Alburgh-Franklin district in Northwest Vermont. He was elected to the state legislature in 2002.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Beth Buchanan</span> American lawyer

Mary Beth Buchanan is the former United States Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania. She was nominated by George W. Bush on September 5, 2001, and confirmed by the United States Senate on September 14, 2001.

<i>Jones v. Dirty World Entertainment Recordings LLC</i> US legal case

Jones v. Dirty World Entertainment Recordings LLC, 755 F.3d 398, is a case in which the United States Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals adopted the Roommates material development test for limiting immunity under section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA). A libel suit was pursued by Sarah Jones, formerly a high school teacher and Cincinnati Ben–Gals cheerleader, against Dirty World, LLC, operator of the celebrity gossip web site TheDirty.com, concerning two postings on TheDirty.com that Dirty World refused to remove.

The Comic Legends Legal Defense Fund (CLLDF) is a Canadian nonprofit organization, created in 1987 to protect the free speech rights of comics creators, publishers, retailers, and readers, by helping to cover legal expenses in the defense of cases where its directors feel those issues are at stake.

United States v. Handley, 564 F. Supp. 2d 996 (2008), was a court case in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa involving obscenity charges stemming from the importation of manga featuring pornographic depictions of fictional minors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bill Cosby sexual assault cases</span> Cases surrounding sexual assault allegations against American comedian

It emerged in late 2014 that Bill Cosby, an American media personality, sexually assaulted dozens of women throughout his career. Cosby made significant contributions to American and African-American culture, and is well known in the United States for his eccentric image, and gained a reputation as "America's Dad" for his portrayal of Cliff Huxtable on The Cosby Show (1984–1992). He received numerous awards and honorary degrees throughout his career, most of which have since been revoked.

On February 6, 2015, three police officers assaulted, detained, and seriously injured Sureshbhai Patel, a 57-year-old Indian national, in a residential neighborhood in Madison, Alabama, U.S. A neighborhood resident called the police on Patel, who was visiting his son and spoke no English, for alleged suspicious behavior in the neighborhood. Video footage from two police car dashboard cameras shows the officer slamming Patel to the ground. He was hospitalized and is partially paralyzed from his injuries. The incident led many citizens to accuse Madison Police Department of police brutality and prompted a response from the Indian government.

The shooting deaths of Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams, two Black American individuals, occurred in East Cleveland, Ohio on November 29, 2012, at the conclusion of a 22-minute police chase which started in downtown Cleveland. Police claimed shots were fired at them as Russell and Williams drove by a squad car; however, this was their vehicle backfiring. Over 60 officers participated in a 23-mile police chase that ended in Russell and Williams' vehicle being surrounded. The victims had no weapon on them and police claimed they fired due to being fired at. Thirteen police officers fired at Russell and Williams 137 times while they were in their car at a parking lot of a middle school, killing both. In May 2014, one of the officers involved, Michael Brelo, was charged with two counts of voluntary manslaughter, and was acquitted by a Cuyahoga County judge of the charges on May 23, 2015.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dawson Five</span> Group of defendants charged with murder

The Dawson Five were defendants in a criminal court case in Dawson, Georgia, where they were charged with the murder of a white customer in a roadside convenience store. The five young black men, one of whom was a juvenile, became known as "The Dawson Five": Roosevelt Watson, Henderson Watson, J. D. Davenport, Johnnie B. Jackson, and George Poor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jussie Smollett hate crime hoax</span> 2019 hate crime hoax

On January 29, 2019, American actor Jussie Smollett approached the Chicago Police Department and reported a hate crime that he had staged earlier that morning. He planned the hate crime with two Nigerian brothers, Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, who had worked as extras on the set of television drama Empire, in which Smollett was a cast member. During the staged attack, which took place on East Lower North Water Street in Chicago's Streeterville neighborhood, the disguised brothers shouted racial and homophobic slurs while one poured bleach on Smollett and the other placed a noose around his neck. In addition to falsely reporting that he had been attacked by two unknown individuals, Smollett described one of them as a white male. He also told police the men shouted "This is MAGA country" during the attack, a reference to the Trumpist political slogan "Make America Great Again". The brothers later testified that Smollett staged the attack near a surveillance camera so that video of it could be publicized.

References

  1. 1 2 3 DA: Comic book case not over Archived 2008-02-20 at the Wayback Machine
  2. 1 2 Retailer Won Case over Evidence Return Gordon Lee's 90s Battle
  3. ↑ PROSECUTOR'S OFFICE SPEAKS ON GORDON LEE CASE [ permanent dead link ]
  4. ↑ Gordon Lee trial quickly ends in a mistrial Archived 2012-07-07 at archive.today
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 "Book Notes". The Washington Post . Archived from the original on 2021-01-27.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Gordon Lee: The Road To Trial Archived 2007-10-11 at the Wayback Machine
  7. 1 2 Cbldf Takes Action in Ga Case -- Files Four Motions to Dismiss
  8. 1 2 3 GORDON LEE: MISTRIAL DECLARED [ permanent dead link ]
  9. 1 2 CBLDF Initiates Obscenity Defense in Georgia Archived 2007-12-19 at the Wayback Machine
  10. ↑ Motion: Law ‘overbroad’ [ permanent dead link ]
  11. ↑ Gordon Lee comic book trial postponed
  12. ↑ Brady, Matt (2008-04-18). "NYCC 08: Gordon Lee Case Dismissed". Newsarama. Archived from the original on 2009-01-26. Retrieved 2008-04-19.
  13. ↑ Comic book store owner chases 2 thieves Archived 2011-06-11 at the Wayback Machine
  14. ↑ Brownstein, Charles (January 14, 2013). "RIP, Gordon Lee". Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.