YNOT – Two Ohio men were sentenced Thursday to one year plus one day each in federal prison after both pleaded guilty to selling obscene materials through the mail.Cousins Sami Harb, 44, and Michael Harb, 35, operated now-defunct Cleveland-based Movies by Mail at the time they were charged with mailing to Utah what prosecutors described as “violent and extreme” DVDs containing adult content “lacking artistic value.” The investigation began with an anonymous tip in 2006 and culminated in arrests after a Salt Lake City-based agent of the FBI’s Adult Obscenity Task Force ordered several DVDs from Movies by Mail’s website. Three of the titles were deemed obscene by Utah standards.
“None of the three films has a plot line,” an FBI investigator wrote in a report filed in support of the charges. “The films consist entirely of scenes of hardcore sexual acts being performed by multiple men and women.”
The Harbs had no role in producing the content, but court documents note they mailed 683 similar packages to Utah in 2006.
Prosecutors sought incarceration for up to five years, but defense attorneys Paul Cambria and Jerry Mooney argued the men were hardworking family guys and encouraged the court to consider home confinement. Sami Harb’s wife suffers from cardiac problems, and Michael Harb’s five-year-old daughter has cancer, according to documents filed in the case. U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart compromised, sentencing each man to 366 days behind bars to be followed by three years’ supervised probation.
