A sex shop baron has been jailed for eight months after nearly selling pornography that was so graphic they weren’t even classified.
Donald McEwan, aged 50, received two four-month sentences for the supply and possession of unclassified films, during a hearing at Manchester Magistrates’ Court.
Manchester City Council trading standards officers accompanied by Greater Manchester Police officers raided his shop, Triple XXX Factor Adult Superstore on Oldham Street, on two separate occasions last year.
Officers seized 743 DVDs during a visit in April and another 749 during a second visit in September.
The films were seized because they were either unclassified – meaning they were illegal to be sold anywhere in the UK due to their graphic nature – or were classified as R18, which can only be sold legally in a licensed sex shop.
Despite the name – Triple XXX Factor Adult Superstore – McEwan’s premises is not licensed as a sex shop.
Councillor Kate Chappell, Manchester City Council’s executive member for the environment, said: “The sex shop and adult film industry is regulated for a good reason, and McEwan clearly felt that these regulations didn’t apply to him.
“This prosecution, and the sentence issued to McEwan, prove that we, along with the police and the courts take this matter very seriously and we can and do take action against those who blatantly flout the law.”
It is not the first time McEwan, of Cloughton Walk, Newton Heath, has been punished for his none-compliance of regulations.
In April 2010, McEwan was jailed for four months after pleading guilty to six offences relating to running unlicensed shops in Manchester city centre’s Northern Quarter, as well as selling 18-rated films without a licence and films that had no official age certification.
Police and officers from the council’s licensing and trading standards units carried out raids on the Big In Amsterdam shop in Tib Street and the Film Factory in Hilton Street and seized a number of videos and DVDs.
In 2007 he was given four three-month sentences to run concurrently and one month, to run consecutively, for non-payment of fines imposed in 2005.
