(1969) The Seven Minutes (87 page)

In Los Angeles, the trial had been temporarily adjourned and the lunch recess had just begun.

On the sixth floor of the Hall of Justice, inside the District Attorney’s personal lounge adjacent to his office, the four of them had cheerfully gathered to enjoy a noonday meal that an expansive Luther Yerkeshad had catered by Scandia Restaurant.

Yerkes had arrived early, before the recess and before the press and the spectators had emptied out of the courtroom. Now, sporting a new auburn hairpiece, blue-tinted glasses, a capacious light-blue sport jacket with medallion buttons, and navy summer slacks, Luther Yerkes squatted like a festive Buddha on the gray linen-covered sofa and devoted himself to the dish of Kalvfilet Oskar -veal cutlets with crab legs - set on the marble-topped coffee table in front of him. Reclining in armchairs on either side of Yerkes, their plates in their laps, were Harvey Underwood and Irwin Blair. Only

Elmo Duncan was not seated. He had consumed but a small portion of the Kalvfilet Oskar and had then restlessly returned to his stapled notes lying atop the walnut radio console.

Chewing steadily, Yerkes watched the District Attorney concentrating on his notes. ‘Elmo, you ought to finish eating -‘ Yerkes began.

Duncan looked up from the notes. ‘Too much food slows me down,’ he said. ‘1 think we’ve got a big afternoon ahead.’

‘Well, you’ve got nothing to worry about,’ said Yerkes. ‘You’ve been magnificent. It’s in the bag.’

Duncan sauntered to the center of the lounge. ‘It’s in the bag when the foreman says Guilty.’ Then he smiled. ‘But I think we’re in good shape. They’ve about run out of witnesses. I’m sure Barrett will rest the defense’s case this afternoon. I’d better be ready for my summation to the jury.’ He tapped his notes. ‘I know you’ve already heard me rehearse this two or three times -‘

‘Four times,’ agreed Irwin Blair with a grin.

Duncan ignored him. “There are a few more points I’d like to work in. Mind if I try them out on you?’

‘Love to hear them,’ said Yerkes, patting his mouth with his napkin. ‘Every syllable is pure gold to me. Speak on, Demosthenes.’

‘First, the part where I review Dr Trimble’s testimony on the relationship of pornography to antisocial conduct. I’d like to shore up this part by citing at least one other authority. Something like this.’ Duncan cleared his throat and automatically assumed an orator’s stance. ‘The findings of numerous other psychiatric specialists support the opinion of Dr Roger Trimble. Among the most respected of these is Dr Nicholas G. Frignito, head psychiatrist of the Philadelphia Municipal Court. It was Dr Frignito who told a congressional committee that fifty per cent of all juvenile delinquents have access to salacious literature or similar materials. It was Dr Frignito who told the committee, “Antisocial, delinquent, and criminal activity frequently results from sexual stimulation by pornography. This abnormal sexual stimulation creates such a demand for expression that gratification by vicarious means follows. Girls run away from their homes and become entangled in prostitution. Boys and young men… become sexually aggressive and generally incorrigible.’ In this very court, you have seen and heard a young man, a decent young man, who was transformed into a sexually aggressive and incorrigible animal by a book, by a book called The Seven Minutes.’ Duncan paused, and bis tone became informal. ‘Then I’ll go on with what you heard when I rehearsed it before, and I’ll dramatize what the book did to Jerry Griffith.’

‘Good,’ said Yerkes.

‘Also, I’d like to anticipate Barrett and cut the ground from under him before he begins prattling, as he’s sure to do, about the guaranties of the First Amendment, and how we’re trying to suppress freedom of speech. Like this.’ Duncan resumed his orator’s pose. ‘In our condemnation of The Seven Minutes, we are not seeking to curb those freedoms spelled out in the First Amendment. For I want to make it clear, this foul book does not fall within the protection of the First Amendment. The fact remains that in the majority opinion on behalf of the Supreme Court in the celebrated Samuel Roth case in 1957, Mr Justice Brennan firmly stated that the First Amendment does not guaranty freedom of speech to the purveyors of obscene material. “The protection given speech and press was fashioned to assure unfettered interchange of ideas for the bringing about of political and social changes desired by the people___All ideas having even the slightest redeeming social importance - unorthodox ideas, controversial ideas, even ideas hateful to the prevailing climate of opinion - have the full protection of the guaranties…. But - ”’

Duncan paused dramatically, and his last word dangled over his listeners like a swaying figure in a cliff-hanger, and then he caught the word, rescued it, and went on.’ “But implicit in the history of the First Amendment,” stated Mr Justice Brennan, still giving the majority opinion of the Court, “is the rejection of obscenity as utterly without redeeming social importance. This rejection for that reason is mirrored in the universal judgment that obscenity should be restrained, reflected in the international agreement of over fifty nations, in the obscenity laws of all of the… states, and in the twenty obscenity laws enacted by the Congress from 1842 to 1956…. We hold that obscenity is not within the area of constitutionally protected speech or press.”

‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, during the days of this trial we have attempted to show you that this book, The Seven Minutes, is totally obscene, utterly without redeeming social importance, and therefore is outside the protection guarantied by the First Amendment to our Constitution. We trust that we have proved that this book deserves to be censored - indeed, to be banished from civilized society forever.’ He looked at the others. ‘How’s that?’

‘Smackeroo, the kayo punch, the flattener,’ Blair chortled. ‘Count ten thousand over Barrett and he still won’t get up.’

‘It’s excellent,’ said Underwood.’

Yerkes cupped a hand over his gold toothpick. ‘I’m more interested in the tag of your closing argument. You were going to make it meatier.’

T have,’ said Duncan. He walked to the console, dropped his notes on it, and returned to the center of the lounge, rubbing his dry hands together. ‘You ready ? Here goes.’ He drew himself up and began to address the unseen jurors. ‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, it is the State’s belief that this book was manufactured by an author with the leer of the professional pornographer and commercialist. To support this contention, we have laid bare the

cynical and sick mind, the sadistic mind, of this pornographer and of all other depraved ghouls like him. We have escorted you on a journey through a subterranean world where dwells, as Senator Smoot once said of the author of Ulysses, “a man with a diseased mind and soul so black that he would even obscure the darkness of hell.” This man is the pornographer whose sole vocation is to survive, even become rich, even derive pleasure, by degrading love, by extolling sin, by infecting the innocent with lust - and who, with every filthy word, continues to rape the Muse. This is the mentality that would pervert the young, mocking rhe warning of Jesus Christ that “if anyone hurts the conscience of one of these little ones that believe in me, he had better have been drowned in the depths of the sea, with a millstone hung about his neck.” This is the pornographer who, if indulged, we have been told by the most respected authorities, will turn our society into a world that is “even more coarse, brutal, anxious, indifferent, deindividualized, hedonistic.”

‘We know, for a fact, from the testimony of our illustrious witness from France, Christian Leroux, and our honorable witness from the Vatican, Father Sarfatti, that J J Jadway was just such a pornographer, was an admitted pornographer who set out to turn our society into a world both coarse and brutal. That he was one of the first victims of his own disreputable work is not our concern here today. What is our concern is that the obscenity that Jadway created not be let loose to seek more victims. We know, to our sorrow, that this book has only recently claimed two new victims, turning Jerry Griffith into a sex criminal against his will, destroying an innocent girl, Sheri Moore. How many more victims will you allow this monster of obscenity, this vile book, this book by J J Jadway, to claim? I implore you to save your children, your homes, your society, your very world, your world and ours, by shackling this monster while you can.

‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, unto your hands I commend the doing of justice in this case, in the knowledge that by your so doing, by your performing this act of justice, you will sleep all the better, because the world will sleep more safely for your verdict. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you.’

Yerkes jumped to his feet, and Underwood and Blair followed him, each of them applauding vigorously.

Duncan, still flushed, offered a sheepish smile. Then, meeting their eyes, he said, ‘I mean it, you know. I mean every word… Well, any suggestions?’

‘Just one,’ said Yerkes. ‘I think we’re ready for our dessert.’

Elsewhere on the sixth floor of the Hall of Justice, within the private quarters of the conference room that the defense had used frequently for the two-hour noon recess, the five of them sat slumped around the table in various attitudes of despondency. It was supposed to be lunch, but to Mike Barrett it was a wake.

Gloomily Barrett, his own sandwich untouched on the plate before him, contemplated first Zelkin and Kimura, then Sanford and Fremont, who were munching their sandwiches and sipping the last of their tepid coffee or flat soft drinks.

Zelkin pushed aside his plate. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘this isn’t exactly the most optimistic victory rally I’ve ever attended.’

‘What’s to cheer about?’ asked Sanford.

Zelkin brought the black portable cassette tape recorder nearer to him. ‘There’s the closing argument Mike dictated in the wee hours this morning. I think it’s a dilly.’ He addressed his partner. ‘Mind if I pick it up where we left off? It might give us a shot in the arm.’

‘What good’s a shot in the arm,’ said Barrett, ‘when the patient’s already expired ?’

‘Let’s listen anyway,’ persisted Zelkin. ‘Maybe we’ll get some ideas.’

He punched the play key, and immediately the tape began unwinding, and Barrett’s recorded summation came metallically through the miniature speaker.

The procedure of the defense in this case has been guided by the wisdom of the most eminent legal minds of our time,’ announced Barrett’s voice from the tape. ‘It was Supreme Court Justice Douglas who wrote, “The idea of using censors to bar thoughts of sex is dangerous. A person without sex thoughts is abnormal. Sex thoughts may induce sex practices that make for better marital relations. Sex thoughts that make love attractive certainly should not be outlawed. If the illicit is included, that should make no constitutional difference. For education concerning the illicit may well stimulate people to seek their experiences in wedlock rather than out of it.”

‘So spoke a Justice of the United States Supreme Court. Not to have sex thoughts is abnormal. To have them is normal. To use laws of obscenity to bar thoughts of sex is dangerous. To ban a work of art because it encourages thinking about sex is menacing to the health of our society. That has been the contention of the defense during the days of this trial.

‘Nor did Justice Douglas alone define our case. In 1957, as a consequence of the celebrated Roth case, another Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Brennan, told us the following: “Sex and obscenity are not synonymous. Obscene material is material which deals with sex in a manner appealing to prurient interest. The portrayal of sex - in art, literature, and scientific works, it not itself sufficient reason to deny material the constitutional protection of freedom of speech and press. Sex, a great and mysterious motive force in human life, has indisputably been a subject of absorbing interest to mankind through the ages; it is one of the vital problems of human interest and public concern.” ’

Barrett winced, hearing his own dictated rehearsal matter, but Zelkin remained fascinated. He fiddled with the tape machine, moving the tape forward, stopping it, starting it again. “There are a couple of passages I’m trying to - Wait, I have it. I want to hear this part again, Mike. Where you discuss the fantasies that pornographic books inspire. Listen, everyone.’

Barrett’s taped speech filled the room.

‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, from the witness stand you have heard the renowned psychiatrist Dr Yale Finegood speak of the harmless effects of pornography. The most sinister effect of such reading, you have heard the witness state, is that it conjures up fantasies in the mind of the reader. Concerning this point, two English psychologists have asked the question, What is so teribly wrong about erotic fantasy and the dissemination of material, even shocking material, that feeds the sexually immature person’s craving for such fantasy ? It is an important question, this one. Before answering it, we might try to learn to what kind of behavior such hallucinations lead ihe reader. It is on record that the great diarist Samuel Pepys read a pornographic book in 1668 and was mightily stimulated by it. The book, published three years earlier, was L’Escole des filles, by Michel Millilot. The story consisted of a dialogue between two women, one a virgin and the other a woman well experienced in sexual intercourse. Pepys called it “a mighty lewd book,” but he read it through and later recorded that it gave him an erection and excited him enough to make him masturbate. This occasional effect of reading a lewd book was understood by another literary figure, the Comte de Mirabeau, a statesman who played a role in the French Revolution and became president of the National Assembly in 1791. When Mirabeau was imprisoned for running off with the nineteen-year-old wife of a seventy-year-old husband, he tried to alleviate the boredom of incarceration by writing both social tracts and books that were pornographic in content. One of the latter was a work entitled Ma Conversion, and with healthy candor Mirabeau prefaced the erotic work with this forthright invitation to his public, “And now, read, devour, masturbate.”’

Zelkin chuckled. ‘Great, Mike. The jury will be hanging on every word. Let’s have the rest.’