Opinion ID: 109865
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Instruction as to Deviant Groups

Text: Challenge is made to the inclusion of members of a deviant sexual group in the charge which recited: The first test to be applied, in determining whether a given picture is obscene, is whether the predominant theme or purpose of the picture, when viewed as a whole and not part by part, and when considered in relation to the intended and probable recipients, is an appeal to the prurient interest of the average person of the community as a whole or the prurient interest of members of a deviant sexual group at the time of mailing. . . . . . In applying this test, the question involved is not how the picture now impresses the individual juror, but rather, considering the intended and probable recipients, how the picture would have impressed the average person, or a member of a deviant sexual group at the time they received the picture. Examination of some of the materials could lead to the reasonable conclusion that their prurient appeal would be more acute to persons of deviant persuasions, but it is equally clear they were intended to arouse the prurient interest of any reader or observer. Nothing prevents a court from giving an instruction on prurient appeal to deviant sexual groups as part of an instruction pertaining to appeal to the average person when the evidence, as here, would support such a charge. See Hamling v. United States, supra, at 128-130. Many of the exhibits depicted aberrant sexual activities. These depictions were generally provided along with or as a part of the materials which apparently were thought likely to appeal to the prurient interest in sex of nondeviant persons. One of the mailings even provided a list of deviant sexual groups which the recipient was asked to mark to indicate interest in receiving the type of materials thought appealing to that particular group. Whether materials are obscene generally can be decided by viewing them; expert testimony is not necessary. Ginzburg v. United States, 383 U. S., at 465; Hamling v. United States, supra, at 100; see Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U. S. 184, 197 (1964) (STEWART, J., concurring). But petitioner claims that to support an instruction on appeal to the prurient interest of deviants, the prosecution must come forward with evidence to guide the jury in its deliberations, since jurors cannot be presumed to know the reaction of such groups to stimuli as they would that of the average person. Concededly, in the past we have reserve[d] judgment . . . on the extreme case . . . where contested materials are directed at such a bizarre deviant group that the experience of the trier of fact would be plainly inadequate to judge whether the material appeals to the [particular] prurient interest. Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, 413 U. S. 49, 56 n. 6 (1973). But here we are not presented with that extreme case because the Government did in fact present expert testimony on rebuttal which, when combined with the exhibits themselves, sufficiently guided the jury. This instruction, therefore, was acceptable.