Grand jury indicts owner of Staunton porn store

By Brad Zinn

STAUNTON — The Staunton grand jury indicted a Manassas man and his company Thursday on 16 felony obscenity charges concerning adult videos that were sold in October at After Hours Video, according to Staunton Prosecutor Raymond C. Robertson.

The six-person grand jury spent Thursday morning viewing parts of 12 videos bought at the Springhill Road video store from Oct. 15 to Oct. 18. It was the second time the grand jury convened within the last month.

"We called them back for this special consideration," Robertson said.

In four multi-count indictments, Rick E. Krial, 40, is charged with eight felony and four misdemeanor counts of selling obscene videos. Krial's company, LSP of Virginia, LLC, was hit with identical charges.

"This is selective prosecution," said Krial, reached by phone Thursday afternoon.

Krial said he canvassed Staunton prior to opening After Hours Video and purchased adult videos at a number of stores. "I did my homework," he said. Since then, he said those same stores have yanked their adult selections in the wake of the controversy surrounding the opening of his store.

"They're running scared because Ray Robertson is handing out felony charges," he said.

Krial, the owner of 12 adult businesses in Virginia and Maryland, said in the past he has caught flak from communities but has never been criminally charged in connection with video sales. He labeled the Staunton indictments as "ludicrous." Asked to elaborate, Krial said, "It is what it is. Everybody's going to have their day in court."

The opening of Krial's Staunton business on Oct. 7 has spawned the Citizens' Task Force Against Pornography and also generated a petition drive supporting After Hours Video. Thursday night, Krial said more than 800 people had signed the petition that's being circulated at the Springhill Road store.

Rick Hudson, a free-speech expert and an attorney with the First Amendment Center in Nashville, said Robertson will have a tough time making the obscenity charges stick.

"They're fairly hard to prove," he said. "It has to be something really out of the ordinary."

The landmark United States Supreme Court case of Miller v. California (1973) established a standard three-part legal definition of obscenity that must be met: Do applied community standards find that the material appeals to the prurient interest; is it patently offensive, sexual conduct defined by state law; and does the work, taken as a whole, lack serious literal, artistic, political or scientific value?

"It's generally difficult to get an obscenity conviction," Hudson said. "But it's not unheard of."

Robertson, who drew a line in the sand in August when he declared he would not "allow dissemination of pornographic material in Staunton," said undercover agents from Virginia State Police, and both the Staunton and Waynesboro police departments took part in the investigation. Other area stores also were targeted, Robertson said, but Krial was the only person charged.