By 1973 it had grown to a string of strip clubs across the state and Flynt put out a newsletter to promote them. After stints in the armed forces and at a General Motors plant, he and his brother opened the Hustler Club in Dayton, Ohio, in 1968. His obscene outbursts once prompted his own lawyer to ask a judge to have Flynt bound and gagged.īorn in 1942, Flynt grew up in poverty in Kentucky and Indiana and dropped out of school after the eighth grade. “Just because I publish pornography does not mean that I am not concerned about the social ills that all of us are,” he once told an interviewer.įlynt was often in legal trouble, fighting obscenity charges or lawsuits, and he often turned courtroom appearances into spectacles. He said he never objected to being labeled a smut peddler as long as he was considered a first amendment crusader, too.
As magazine circulation slipped, he stayed ahead of trends by investing in adult-oriented television channels, a casino, film distribution and merchandise. After he was paralyzed, Flynt had penile implant surgery so he could continue to have sex.įlynt created a business with an estimated turnover of $150m at one point. He wrote in his autobiography that his first sexual experience was with a chicken and told of having sex every four or five hours during a workday. In his heyday, Flynt lived a life that could have made Caligula blush.
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Falwell sued for $50m over a fake ad published in Hustler, which depicted Falwell saying his first sexual encounter had been with his mother, but the supreme court ultimately ruled the ad was a parody and protected by free speech. In the most famous, the US supreme court ruled in favor of Flynt in a libel battle with the evangelist Jerry Falwell.
Flynt suffered from a variety of health problems since a 1978 assassination attempt that left him paraplegic.įlynt loved to aggravate his critics with stunts such as wearing a diaper made from an American flag to court and was involved in a number of legal battles. The newspaper said Flynt’s brother Jimmy had confirmed his death but did not cite a specific cause. In one action he claimed the nephews were producing inferior films under the Flynt name that were an embarrassment to him.Larry Flynt Jr, the publisher of Hustler magazine who used his pornography empire and flair for the outrageous to push the limits of free speech, has died at the age of 78, the Washington Post reported on Wednesday. He also had legal run-ins with his brother and nephews over the years. The store paid a $10,000 fine and agreed to stop selling X-rated videos as part of a plea agreement. He and his brother, Jimmy, who owned a store in Cincinnati, were indicted on obscenity and conspiracy charges. The charge was eventually overturned on appeal.įlynt also had a second run-in with authorities in Ohio in the late 1990s. He was found in contempt of court for screaming profanities at federal judges, and served several months. With a gruff voice but otherwise friendly demeanor, he rarely missed an opportunity to promote himself.Īmong his many legal battles was a dispute that erupted in 1983 when he said he obtained an FBI tape related to a drug sting involving carmaker John DeLorean.
He added, “I loved him and may he rest in peace.”įrom his beginnings as a fledgling Ohio strip club owner to his reign as founder of one of the most outrageously explicit adult-oriented magazines, Flynt constantly challenged the establishment and was intensely disliked by the religious right and feminist groups that said he demeaned women and put them at risk with pictures of bondage and other controversial acts.Ī sober Flynt eventually returned to work, pain eased by surgery, and he tooled around his office in his signature gold-plated wheelchair. “He suffered decades of health issues and you can imagine it was pretty difficult,” said his nephew Jimmy Flynt Jr. He had been paralyzed and nearly killed in a 1986 assassination attempt. LOS ANGELES (AP) - Porn purveyor Larry Flynt, who built Hustler magazine into an adult entertainment juggernaut that included casinos, films, websites and other enterprises as he relentlessly championed First Amendment rights, has died at age 78.įlynt, who had been in declining health, died Wednesday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, his longtime attorney, Paul Cambria, told The Associated Press.