Google helps judge define 'obscene'

US Lawyers get Google to strip for common decency.

A cunning US defence lawyer is apparently planning on using Google search data to sway jurors with hard facts; people are more likely to search for the word 'orgy' than for 'apple pie', and therefore sexually explicit content is not obscene, it is socially acceptable.

Lawrence Walters, council for the defence in a trial scheduled for July 1st, intends to befuddle the jury by showing that online interest in sex is actually greater than online interest in other things, ergo it is normal and socially acceptable. But of course, we at Atomic have known that for ages.

This, Walters hopes, will get his insalubrious client, Clinton Raymond McCowen, off the hook for prostitution, racketeering and distributing obscene material through a Web site. Sounds like a long (money)shot to us.

"Time and time again you’ll have jurors sitting on a jury panel who will condemn material that they routinely consume in private," tut-tutted Walters. In the US, something can be deemed obscene based on a 1973 law put in place under a fundamentalist evangelical president. The legislation requires all unwholesome interest in sex to pass the litmus test of "contemporary community standards", hence Mr. Walters’ ploy.

Knowing that a bird in the hand is better than one in the bush, Walters has also decided he will not just rely on Google Trends to show up the naughty habits of Santa Rosa County residents, he has also subpoenaed Google for more specific search data. The subpoena hopes to get all the ins and outs of the actual number of searches for certain sexual topics performed by local residents.

The Florida state prosecutor, Russ Edgar, doesn’t seem impressed though. Still said to be weighing whether or not he should block the search data’s use in court, Edgar, in true Republican fashion noted "how many times you do something doesn’t necessarily speak to standards and values". Must be how America can continue to maintain they are a peace and freedom loving country then. Or how so many Republican male senators can sleep with men but not be gay.

Still, Mr. Edgar may not really have cause for distress just yet. According to the New York Times, 'Nascar,' 'surfing' and 'Nintendo' all beat 'orgy' in online searches in Pensacola.