Judge Convicts Two in Avatar Trial: 'What Justifies Words Like These?'

Avatar, the beleaguered underground newspaper, suffered another legal defeat yesterday in Boston Municipal Court.

Robert Roman, 21, employee of a Boston psychedelic art shop called "Like Nothing Else," was found guilty of selling obscene literature, specifically the 13th issue of Avatar. He received a three-month sentence in the House of Correction.

Edward Beardsley, 27, advertising manager for Avatar, was convicted of possessing obscene material for sale, distribution, or loan. On November 30, Beardsley was working in Avatar's Boston office when members of the vice squad confiscated 5000 copies of various issues.

Defense attorney Joseph S. Oteri, who conducted the recent marijuana test case in Boston, began to argue that the literature's mere presence did not prove that Beardsley intended to distribute it.

"You're falling back on a technicality," admonished Judge Elijah Adlow '15. "This is first and foremost a question of morality."

"I'm a lawyer," said Oteri. "And I thought this was a court of law."

Beardsley was sentenced to six months in the House of Correction. Both he and Roman will make appeals to the Massachusetts Superior Court.

Adlow made his decisions after reading certain choice portions of recent Avatar issues, including the celebrated centerfold of four-letter words and alleged account of the judge's own conduct in his Nov. 8 obsenity conviction of Avatar's 11th issue. According to that account, Adlow told bickering lawyers: "Shut up you c----and let's get this f----show on the road before the mammy-jamming sun goes down. . . . Ah b----, this is getting boring. I'm going home to read Avatar."

"The reporter for the paper needs a hearing aid," said Adlow. "I use those words only in select conversations."

Oteri explained that the alleged obscenities were deliberate social parody. "Unfortunately, we of the older generation rise to the bait," he said.

"What social protest justifies words like these?" countered Adlow. "They didn't use these words in the French Revolution." Many heads nodded and rolled in the audience.

Oteri claimed that Avatar was required reading at the Harvard Divinity School.

"So much the worse for the Harvard Divinity School," said Adlow. "Over there they are interested in both ends--the top and the bottom. It's a quest for Paradise Lost."

Adlow said, "because of things like Avatar, people are being alienated from those standards of industry and decency necessary for a useful, healthy and productive society."

Filth

The Judge then branched out to attack the United States Supreme Court's leniency towards alleged obscenity "At our humble and low level, this filth doesn't go," said Adlow. "Who's getting excited about the Supreme Court? Thank God the people still maintain standards in the community."

"You know I'll go all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary," said Oteri.

"I hope you do," said Adlow. "When they look at this, they're going to crawl out of their black pajamas and censor it."