WASHINGTON, DC — The United States Supreme Court yesterday refused to hear adult retailer Sherri Williams’ objections to the state of Alabama’s ban on sex toy sales. The court elected to leave a lower court’s ruling intact, allowing the ban to continue.Williams owns two stores in Alabama and has fought the ban in court for nine years.
“My motto has been, they are going to have to pry this vibrator from my cold, dead hand. I refuse to give up,” Williams said to the Associated Press. “The U.S. Supreme Court said states can legislate morality,” she said. “I don’t feel it is fair to the people who do not agree with the morality of the Legislature.”
Alabama’s anti-obscenity law, enacted in 1998, bans the distribution of “any device designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs for anything of pecuniary value.” Although it bans purchases of sex toys from Alabama merchants, it does not outlaw possession of sex toys and allows for the use of devices that have “a bona fide medical” purpose.
The state’s attorney general, Troy King, is planning to ask a federal judge to lift an injunction preventing the law from being enforced.
“Removing the injunction should take a couple of days,” said Chris Bence, spokesman for the attorney general.
Any retailer who sells a sex toy after the injunction is lifted faces up to a year in jail and a $10,000 fine. The retailer’s second offense raises the jail time to up to 10 years.
Williams said she would not change what products she sells, just how she markets them.
“As of tomorrow, we will not be selling toys for the stimulation of human genitals. We’ll be selling toys for medical purposes and to relieve stress,” Williams said to the Decatur Daily. She said the inventory will not change, just “the way we sell it.”
Luckily, at least one county in the state doesn’t sound ready to leap at the chance to arrest adult retailers.
Madison County District Attorney Tim Morgan said he did not plan to mount a campaign against sex toy retailers but would consider cases supplied by police.
“It’s a pretty low priority,” said Morgan. “We’ve got plenty of work to do. We don’t need to be going out drumming up business. We’ve got real crimes.”
