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From www.geneross.com: "Industry legend Milton Luros, founder of the original Parliament News and London Press was laid to rest at Groman-Eden Wednesday in Granada Hills. Luros known as "the king of magazines" is considered the last of the oldtimers in the adult business. Along with Reuben Sturman, Michael Thevis, and Michael Zaffarano, Luros formed the industry's original four horsemen. The four virtually created the porno business in the late 1950's and early 60's. Luros died Monday [4/21/99] after a lengthy illness. He was 87 years old and lived in Northridge, California." Luke: "Consider these "four horsemen" credited with starting the porno industry. Luros chiefly made his fortune through piracy and corporate shell shuffling, which was imitated by porn godfather Reuben Sturman, who dealt in child porn and bestiality, cheated massively on his taxes, and worked closely with such mobsters as Gambino capo Robert DiBernardo. Michael Thevis has been convicted of murdering competitors. Michael Zaffarano was a captain in the crime family of Joseph Bonanno and Carmine Galante. A long time partner of Zaffarano and a former member of the DeCavalcante family, DiBernardo joined the Gambinos in 1976. He was murdered in 1986 by the order of John Gotti. To folks like Adult Video News, Edward Wedelstedt and Russ Hampshire, these four horsemen are heroes of free speech, right up there with the authors of the Declaration of Independance and the Magna Carta." John Bone's employee, the veteran photographer David Story, writes to www.geneross.com: "I started my career in California in 1964 when introduced to Milt Luros by one of the people mentioned in a not-so-nice way by a bottom-feeding piece of gutter slime [Luke F-rd?]. Milt Luros was a caring, giving person who helped many of the people starting out, get the push they needed. "The major thing is that without Milt Luros, Reuben Sturman and
others that took the s--- and heat and the lawsuits and jail time during
that period, we would not be in the business that we now see people
like the gutter scum trying to kill. Luros leaves behind his sons LA Superior Court Judge Michael Luros and Dr. Richard Luros. Milton donated tens of thousands of dollars to Jerry Brown's campaign, just like pornographers today adore Clinton. It's no coincidence that people of similarly low moral character like each other. Los Angeles Times, 4/5/92 In 1979 and 1980, Michael Scott Luros and his parents contributed $2,066 to Brown. The next year, the family threw a fund-raising reception for Brown at their Northridge home and also contributed another $5,000. In April, 1981, Luros was named a judge on the Los Angeles Municipal Court. Normally aloof from the process, Brown himself may have been more involved in the appointment of Luros, whose father, Milton Luros, was a convicted pornographer. Because of the family's controversial background, "the governor knew the details of that one, I'm pretty sure," said Collins, the former chief of staff. He said Georgiou pressed for Luros, using the argument, "Don't visit the sins of the father on the son." At the time, the Luros appointment made headlines because Brown was photographed emerging from a reception at the family home in Northridge. The photo appeared in the Los Angeles Daily News under the headline: "One-Time Porn Distributor Hosts Gov. Brown Fund-Raiser." In response to the publicity, Brown returned $3,800 to the Luros family. Brown indicated Luros had been an active volunteer in his campaign. "He was always there," he said, referring to Michael Luros. "He showed up at the office. He was bringing in sandwiches, cookies, trying to be as helpful as he could. He won the hearts and souls . . . of the people who worked in the campaign." Luros and his parents declined to be interviewed, but his brother, Richard, a physician, insisted there was no connection between the contributions and the appointment. January 30, 1977, Washington Post: A man named Milton Luros was once described by a Los Angeles district attorney as "the biggest pornography publisher in Southern California and operator of a multi-million-dollar conglomerate." In a 1972 lawsuit, it was alleged that Luros operated companies under the names of American Art Enterprises (a publishing company), World News Inc., Seven Towers Inc., Academy Press, Socio Library, London Press, Oxford Bindery and (Lollitots') Parliament News Inc. Although Paul Wisner is listed as president of Parliament, Luros is still active in the organization. Today, if you call Parliament News and ask to speak to Luros, the operator refers you to American Art Enterprises, the publishing house. The operator there informs you that "we go by several names." If you then ask Paul Wisner, she refers you back to Parliament News. Helgeson said there is another seperate obscenity case pending against Parliament News. Asked if there were any convictions against Wisner, Fleischman replied, "Never one that stuck. The jury convicted and the trial judge dismissed." Fleischman says American Art Enterprises is not Lollitots' publisher. When told that the publisher listed on the masthead was a fake, Fleischman repeated that Parliament had nothing to do with the publisher. It was pointed out that any distributor has to pay some person or company supplying the printed material, who in turn knows the publisher. "What are you doing, hounding me?" he snapped. Wisner, out on bail, said he did not know who published Lollitots. "It comes from overseas. It's published overseas." Reporter: "But the masthead states that it is published by Delta Publishing in Wilmington, Del." Wisner: "Yeah, that's who we deal with." Reporter: "But that company does not and never did exist, according to Wilmington authorities." Wisner: "That's who we deal with." "But if it's nonexistent, how can you deal with them?" Wisner: "We deal with an agent." "In the United States?" Wisner: "Yes." "Then why do you say it is published overseas?" Wisner: "I'm not interested in any interpretation of that." He would not give the name of the agent. Wisner was told that some people find the material in Lollitots objectionable, that they think the children are being sexually exploited and that they would like to find the publisher and photographers to prosecute them. "That is not of any interest to me. I'm the distributor. If somebody's interested in that, that's their problem. That's not my problem." 1/6/01 VancouverSun.com reports: A longtime Vancouver pornography importer and distributor is now exporting to the U.S. a potentially deadly chemical that is widely thought to enhance sexual pleasure but is illegal in both Canada and the States if sold for that purpose. Tony Perry is one of two directors of AAA Packaging of Delta, which has shipped hundreds of thousands of units of isobutyl nitrite to customers in almost every state in the United States, according to documents obtained by The Vancouver Sun. A [1973?] report prepared by CLEU -- the now-defunct Coordinated Law Enforcement Unit, a joint operation of the RCMP and municipal forces formed to fight organized crime -- noted that sex stores were selling magazines grouped according to such subject areas as "bondage," "homosexual," "heterosexual," and "kiddie porn." It was the latter that caused then-Vancouver Mayor Jack Volrich to take matters in his own hands. Magazines called Moppets and Nudist Moppets were being displayed in city stores, and Volrich said those magazines crossed the line. The Moppets magazines were distributed by Johnson and Franklin. Volrich said at the time it was difficult for the city to deal with magazines that contained adult nudity. "But this (Moppets) can only be designed for people who have perverse habits," the mayor said. Volrich went downtown, visited the stores selling Moppets and ordered the store owners to remove the offending books from their shelves, using as his leverage provisions of the city charter that prohibit businesses from "gross misconduct." Moppets, the mayor said, "depict children in a very gross manner." The store-keepers complied. Contacted by reporters, Perry said all his product was cleared by Canada Customs. "But if somebody in authority at the local level has any objection, they should just let us know and we'll withdraw it," Perry said at the time. "I'm just trying to make a living, not break the law." He added: "I order from catalogues -- it's not up to me and neither is it proper for me to check the validity of my suppliers." The suppliers of Moppets would not have appreciated being "checked out." The Moppets magazines were published and distributed by a company called Lynden Distributors of Van Nuys, California, a CLEU investigation determined. The company was controlled by the late Reuben Sturman, a mobster from Cleveland with ties to New York crime families. Sturman is also credited with inventing the peep booth, by enclosing coin-operated projectors in a small booth with a screen and a door that could be locked. Tony Perry had several peep booths in his stores. Sturman, according to several U.S. crime probes, supplied booths to adult-book store owners free of charge, in return for half the receipts. A never-before- published report by the Middle Atlantic-Great Lakes Organized crime law enforcement network showed Sturman's empire spanned the U.S., Europe, South America and Africa. Sturman reached into Canada through his ownership of Bret Distributors Inc. of Toronto, a connection that has never before been published. Organized crime commissions in the U.S. heard repeated testimony that Sturman took orders from -- or at least paid kickbacks to -- leaders of the Gambino crime family in New York. Convicted of tax evasion in 1992, Sturman died in a U.S. prison in 1997. In a brief to a House of Commons committee on crime in 1978, B.C. police agencies said of Perry's company: "Johnson and Franklin were the major distributors of this material in British Columbia and have been shown to obtain the majority of their material through their organized crime contacts." The brief continued: "A prior investigation by the Vancouver police department and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police established that seizures of pornographic material by police were written off by the organized crime concerns and not charged to Johnson and Franklin." Luke says: Read more about Moppets and child porn here. And read here about Reuben Sturman. And here about the Mafia and porn. Lynne L-patin remembers working with Moppets distributor Paul Wisner. Just in case there's any doubt, here's a small list of pornographers who created and distributed child pornography: Paul Wisner, Milton Luros, Reuben Sturman, Parliament News which morphed into Gourmet Video, Circus of Books and the list goes on and on and on. And folks like the revered late Stanley Fleischman led the charge defending child pornography and obfuscating the issue of child porn.
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