HIGH COURT SAYS STATES CAN USE ANTI-RACKET LAWS AGAINST PORN

The Supreme Court ruled this week that states may use anti-racketeering laws to fight pornography, but invoked free-speech rights to ban the states from seizing before trial the contents of adult bookstores. The justices said authorities unlawfully seized the contents of a Fort Wayne, Ind., bookstore before any materials in the store were judged obscene at a trial. But by a 6-to-3 vote, the justices said prosecutors still may use the state's anti-racketeering law to renew the obscenity case. Justice Byron White said the Constitution's free-speech protections do not bar states from using alleged acts of obscenity as a basis for an anti-racketeering law.