Morality in Media organized a news conference Oct. 28, 1997 to declare President Clinton soft on porn.

A group of pro-family leaders charged Clinton with failure to enforce obscenity laws and recommended various actions.

From a high of 78 in 1989 under Bush, obscenity prosecutions declined to a low of 17 in 1996 under Clinton. The Clinton Justice Department rejected referrals for obscenity violations by other investigative agencies at the rate of 68% during 1993, 95% in 1994, 100% in 1995, and 95% in 1996.

J. Robert Flores served as Acting Deputy Chief of the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section from 1994-97. He now works as Senior Counsel for the Natonal Law Center for Children and Families. He says the Clinton Justice Department has no publicly stated goals for obscenity prosecutions, not strategic plan, and no training in obscenity enforcement for prosecutors.

In 1994, AVN wrote that, "Adult obscenity enforcement by the federal government is practically nonexistent since the administration changed." In 1996 AVN referred to Clinton's "hands-nearly-off porn policy" and urged its readers in the porn business to "vote for him."

A public opinion poll commission by Morality in Media found that 80% of Americans believed that federal obscenity laws against hardcore pornography should be vigorously enforced.

In its 7-22-96 issue, Insight magazine detailed the corruption and damaging leaks from the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section of the Justice Department that, according to one source, resulted in the death of an informant.

In 1987, Attorney General Edwin Meese created a special section in the Criminal Division of the Justice Department to prosecute the makers, sellers and distributors of pornographic videos and magazines. During the late eighties and early nineties, Meese's brainchild, the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, or CEOS, secured impressive courtroom victories in the legal battle against hardcore pornography. In nine years, the 15-strong CEOS racked up 135 convictions (including against VCA and Vivid).

Most of these convictions came during the Bush administration, when Minnesota-born Patrick Trueman was CEOS chief. Trueman, now head lobbyist for the American Family Association, a Mississippi-based conservative group boasting a membership of 1.6 million, left the section in January 1993. An unrelenting critic of the Clinton White House, Trueman contends that the $8 billion pornography industry has been left alone by the Clinton Adminstration. 

"You never hear Clinton or [Attorney General] Janet Reno speaking about this as a priority," he told Insight.

Religious groups and Republican senators blame Attorney General Janet Reno for being soft on porn.

Congressional investigators and current and past Justice Department officials say that the federal government's battle against the pornographers has been seriously harmed by a Justice Department bureaucracy that has sought to cover up major internal problems at CEOS spanning both the Bush and Clinton administrations. They trace the beginning of those problems to Trueman's tenure as chief of the anti-obscenity unit.

Former CEOS attorneys and current Justice officials told Insight magazine that the convictions during Trueman's years came from cases initiated in 1987 and 1988 by the first section chief, H. Robert Showers.

Sources told Insight that the CEOS suffered from low morale, missteps, litigation errors, personality clashes and poor leadership. The sources also say that one major multi-state federal investigation was botched by the odd -- some sources say sinister -- loss of crucial documentary evidence.

Insight secured a copy of the private prosecutorial notes of an assistant U.S. attorney, Susan Morgan, who helped lead a major Houston-based porn prosecution called "Blue Darcy." The multidefendant case was one of the biggest and most complex ever brought, but it fell apart because of the internal problems in the anti-obscenity unit. In her notes Morgan records her frustrations at the difficulties she encountered. One entry made on July 24, 1992, reads: "I just love being in a litigation section where the chief [Trueman] and deputy chief have so little understanding of what is necessary and important in a trial. For that matter, I love being in an entire division where no one understands the need for exhibits, litigation support or travel."

Insight uncovered a cozy relationship between Trueman's handpicked deputy, George Burgasser, and prominent pornography defense lawyer Arthur Schwartz, a Denver-based attorney for powerful pornographer Edward J. Wedelstedt.

Prompted by Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, chairman of the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts, the General Accounting Office is investigating whether the Justice Department failed to take seriously a series of leaks from CEOS in 1992 and 1993 that in one case -- the Blue Darcy prosecution -- endangered an FBI confidential informant. The leak could have led to the informant's death, or so the G-man who handled him, Robert E. Lee III, claimed in an affidavit.

Insight also has learned that the GAO wants to know if senior Justice Department officials, including Trueman and Burgasser (who later became acting section chief) "circled the bureaucratic wagons," as one investigator put it. The GAO is investigating whether the two men launched a retaliatory official travel audit into CEOS attorney Kevin Byrnes, who had filed an official complaint with Susan Morgan against Burgasser claiming that he tipped off Schwartz about the presence of the Blue Darcy informant.

Trueman denies all allegations concerning Blue Darcy. "What is so appalling to me," he says, "is that a reporter can get hold of this kind of information. I would like to say many things, but I can't. The whole thing is part of a witch-hunt against me by Senator Grassley," who Trueman alleges has been leaking "confidential material obtained by subpoena from the Justice Department."

Insight says that the Blue Darcy mess began in February 1992 after Morgan and the FBI's Lee were told by their agitated confidential informant, or CI, that a CEOS leak had taken place. Lee states in his affidavit: "Upon meeting with the CI, he informed us that the existence of a CI in the case had been leaked to the defense at a gathering of pornographers and their lawyers. The CI reported to us that at this meeting Arthur Schwartz, a prominent pornography lawyer, reported on the status of various pornography prosecutions in the United States. Mr Schwartz said that he had been discussing these prosecutions with a member of the pornography unit's staff in Washington.' Mr Schwartz then specifically referred to the Houston prosecution by name and stated that he had been talking to a pornography unit staff member ... [who] responded that there existed a highly placed insider' in the Houston case who could implicate the defendants."

Insight 7-22-96 continues:

Shocked by the leak, Morgan and Byrnes turned for advice to Mary Spearing, head of the General Litigation Service at Justice, and Bruce Taylor, a senior CEOS attorney. All four immediately suspected that Burgasser was the source of the leak because, according to Byrnes' affidavit, "only one individual in the section had access to the information and had carried on regular contact with Mr Schwartz, and that was CEOS Deputy Chief George Burgasser." Spearing also warned Byrnes and Morgan not to go to "CEOS Chief Patrick Trueman regarding the matter, as he would undoubtedly confer with and take the side of Mr Burgasser," or so Byrnes claims in his affidavit.

Morgan and Byrnes went to then-Deputy Assistant Attorney General Paul Maloney -- who now is a state appeals judge in Michigan -- and informed him of the leak and their suspicion that Burgasser was the source. They were bewildered to discover soon after that Maloney instructed Burgasser himself to investigate the leak. Maloney's "response to the reporting of the leak was to inform Mr Burgasser of the possible unauthorized disclosure and to instruct Mr Burgasser to investigate it," Byrnes notes in his affidavit. "No investigation ever occurred," he adds. Maloney did not return an Insight phone call.

Soon after Morgan and Byrnes confided in Maloney, an aggressive travel audit was launched by Trueman and Burgasser against Byrnes, according to Byrnes' affidavit. The long audit discovered discrepancies of approximately $300 in the attorney's travel expenses of nearly $40,000. After representations by the Washington law firm Shaw, Bransford & O'Rourke, which Byrnes retained, then-Assistant Attorney General Webster Hubbell intervened and assured the trial attorney's lawyers that no criticism of Byrnes would be entered into his personnel file. Byrnes was transferred to work for U.S. Attorney Holder. He is described by Justice spokesman Stern as a "terrific prosecutor."

Last January, when Grassley began to make inquiries about the Blue Darcy case, Burgasser was relocated to Buffalo, N.Y., to work in the U.S. attorney's office there. Stern claims the move is not connected to the Blue Darcy case. But Trueman told Insight that the transfer was "connected to the allegations." A Justice Department source says: "They wanted to get Burgasser out of the way in case this whole thing blows up. If it does, one question should be: Where was Reno in all of this?"