The Crime Magazines

A bookdealer in a large city had magazines for sale that were filled with true-crime stories and pictures — accounts of criminal deeds involving bloodshed and lust. He was prosecuted under a state law that made it a crime to sell, or possess with intent to sell, any publication principally made up of criminal news, police reports, or stories of deeds of bloodshed, lust or crime. The prosecution said the magazines fell squarely within the law, which was aimed at publications that could incite crime. The defence argued the statute was so vague that no one could tell which publications it covered, and that it punished material protected as free expression.