Extreme Associates and its Owners, Robert Zicari and Janet Romano, Plead Guilty to...

Extreme Associates and its Owners, Robert Zicari and Janet Romano, Plead
Guilty to Violating Federal Obscenity Laws

California-based Company Mailed, Distributed Via Internet Obscene Materials to
Pennsylvania

PITTSBURGH, March 11 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A California-based company
that produced and distributed obscene materials and its owners pleaded guilty
in federal court in Pittsburgh today to violating federal obscenity laws, U.S.
Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan announced.

Extreme Associates, Inc., of North Hollywood, Calif,; Robert Zicari, a/k/a Rob
Black, 35; and Janet Romano, a/k/a/ Lizzie Borden, 32; both of Northridge,
Calif., pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Gary L. Lancaster to a
felony charge of conspiracy to distribute obscene material through the mails
and over the Internet. Through their plea agreements, the company and its
owners acknowledged responsibility for the conduct charged in Counts 2 through
10 of the indictment - distributing three videos through the mail and six
individual video clips over the Internet to western Pennsylvania. In addition,
they forfeited to the United States the Internet domain name,
extremeassociates.com, which was used to commit the violations. The company is
now defunct.

"Extreme Associates maintained a website through which it engaged in the
business of producing, selling and distributing obscene videotapes, DVDs, and
computer files in interstate commerce. This case affirms that no matter who
you are, or where you are, certain abhorrent behavior simply violates our
community's standards," stated Ms. Buchanan.

In connection with the guilty plea, the court was advised that Zicari and
Romano, through Extreme Associates, Inc., mailed obscene films entitled "Force
Entry - Director's Cut," "Cocktails 2 - Directors Cut," and "Extreme Teen #24"
to the Western District of Pennsylvania. "Forced Entry" portrays the rape and
murder of three women, who are slapped, hit, spit upon and generally abused
and degraded throughout graphic portrayals of forced sex acts. In "Cocktails
#2," women engage in sex acts with multiple partners while a bowl, placed in
front of the women, is filled with various bodily liquids. At the conclusion
of each vignette, the women drink the concoction. Finally, "Extreme Teen #24"
portrays abusive sexual acts between adult males and females dressed to look
like minor children. In addition, the defendants transmitted six obscene video
clips over the Internet through their website. The six video clips are
entitled "valeriejospit," "jewel," "pz_summerbreeze," "dp.gangbang.7,"
"miacum," and "analasspirations1." The clips range in length from 37 seconds
to two minutes, 54 seconds.

Ms. Buchanan said that in 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court stated in Miller v.
California that materials are obscene if they satisfy a three part test:
(1) The average person, applying contemporary community standards, finds that
the material taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest; and
(2) The average person, applying contemporary community standards, finds that
the material depicts sexual conduct in patently offensive manner; and
(3) A reasonable person, viewing the material as a whole, finds that the
material lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.

The plea concedes that the charged materials are obscene under the Miller
test, and that the distribution of these materials is illegal.

Extreme Associates, Inc. was the subject of a PBS Frontline documentary
entitled "American Porn," which aired nationwide on Feb. 7, 2002. That program
showed non-sexually explicit portions of the filming of the video, "Forced
Entry," which depicts the brutal rapes and murders of several women.

As part of the investigation, undercover U.S. Postal Inspectors visited the
Extreme Associates website and purchased certain obscene videotapes, which
Extreme Associates delivered through U.S. mails. Inspectors also downloaded
several obscene video clips.

In August 2003, a federal grand jury in Pittsburgh returned a ten-count
indictment against Extreme Associates for violating the federal obscenity
statutes. In January 2005, Judge Lancaster dismissed the indictment on the
basis that the federal obscenity statutes were unconstitutional. The
government appealed and Ms. Buchanan argued the case in October 2005 before
the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.

On Dec. 8, 2005, the Court of Appeals reversed the decision of the District
Court, denied the defendant's constitutional challenge and held that the
federal statutes regulating the distribution of obscenity do not violate any
constitutional right to privacy. The case was then remanded back to the
District Court. The Court of Appeals recognized that the U.S. Supreme Court
had consistently upheld the obscenity statutes in the face of constitutional
challenges.

Judge Lancaster scheduled sentencing for July 1, 2009, at 9:30 a.m. The law
provides that Zicari and Romano face a maximum total sentence of five years in
prison, a fine of $250,000, or both. Extreme Associates, Inc. faces a maximum
total sentence of probation of five years and a fine of $500,000. Under the
Federal Sentencing Guidelines, the actual sentence imposed is based upon the
seriousness of the offense and the prior criminal history, if any, of the
defendant.

U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan, Assistant U.S. Attorneys Stephen R. Kaufman
and Christine A. Sanner, and Damon A. King, a Trial Attorney with the Child
Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS) of the Criminal Division, are
prosecuting this case for the government. The U.S. Postal Inspection Service,
with investigative assistance from the Pornography Unit of the Los Angeles
Police Department's Organized Crime and Vice Division and from CEOS' High
Technology Investigative Unit, conducted the investigation that led to the
prosecution of Extreme Associates, Robert Zicari and Janet Romano.

SOURCE U.S. Department of Justice

Margaret Philbin of the U.S. Department of Justice, +1-412-894-7312,
margaret.philbin@usdoj.gov