Zitat
Suspended sentence of racy comics publisher switched to fine
The Tokyo High Court on Thursday reduced the sentence imposed by a lower court on a comic book publisher who was convicted of distributing obscene comic books featuring graphic sex scenes.
While the court upheld the conviction, it lowered Motonori Kishi's sentence from a suspended prison term to a fine.
The court ordered Kishi, 56, to pay a 1.5 million yen fine, overturning the suspended one-year prison term that the Tokyo District Court had handed down in January 2004.
Presiding Judge Kenjiro Tao deemed that the comics were obscene, but added, "There is a considerable gap in obscenity compared with that in material of real images, such as DVDs."
As such, sentencing the defendant to prison was too severe, he said.
He also rejected the defendant's plea that Article 175 of the Penal Code, which prohibits the sale and distribution of obscene literature, is unconstitutional as it violates freedom of expression.
The trial was the first major case in some 20 years in Japan to focus on printed pornographic material. It was also the first time Japanese comic books, or "manga," had been targeted under the Penal Code.
Kishi, president of Tokyo-based comic book publisher Shobunkan Co., was accused of distributing some 20,000 copies of the comic book Misshitsu (Honey Room) among 16 firms in April 2002.
The Tokyo District Court had ruled that the Penal Code "has indirectly contributed to maintaining sexual morality and healthy sexual behavior in society, and it should not be considered unconstitutional to restrict expression, including sexual expressions, if they harm the public good."
In finding Kishi guilty and sentencing him, the court had said, "We cannot overlook the fact that the defendant brought about harmful influences on sexual morality" by distributing the comic.
Both the district and high courts based their rulings on the work's obscenity on three prerequisites under a 1957 Supreme Court ruling. In a judgment against the translator and publisher of "Lady Chatterley's Lover" by D.H. Lawrence, the ruling stated that expression is obscene when it is "unnecessarily sexually stimulating, damages the normal sexual sense of shame of ordinary people, or is against good sexual moral principles."
The author of the comic has already been fined 500,000 yen.
...
Zitieren
Die Seite sollte detailiert für japanische Gehirne beschreiben, wie man Hentai von fremdsprachigen Seiten herunterlädt. Sogar den Flashget erwähnt man. 
