The Porn Industry

The Porn Industry has always been a profitable but not front line area of crime.  The sex trade has always been a bit of a taboo for many professional criminals as they saw it as something beneath them.  It seems extraordinary that people who thought nothing of maiming and killing others, could be seen as shrinking violets when it came to the sex game, whether it be prostitution or pornography.  What they had no hesitation with, was extracting money from the makers, suppliers and sellers of porn.

    Around the mid 60`s, Richardson gang member George Cornell moved in on them, providing "protection" for west end pornographers, which essentially was extortion.  It has been claimed that the Krays asked to be let in on the racket but Cornell knocked them back, which is said to have led to the animosity that resulted in Cornell being shot dead.

    However, it was in the early 70`s that the porn business hit the headlines when it was alleged that the Scotland Yard Porn Squad, was running the most lucrative protection rackets in London.  Names that emerged were Bernie Silver and Jimmy Humphreys.  Members of the Porn Squad, after a very high profile trial, were jailed, though one of the Police Chiefs convicted, had his sentence over turned on appeal.  It was Humphreys who brought down the head of the Flying Squad, as the cop went on holiday abroad with him.

    Later on in the 80`s and the advent of video made many people turn their hands to amateur porn, away from the 8mm films that were the vogue.  No need for projectors, just pop the tape into the machine and off you go.  Now with the Internet, everything is so much easier.  Web cams, downloading, pictures on pcs, nothing could be simpler.  They just embrace the new technology as it comes along.

    The people involved in the trade try to portray the industry as an honourable one, it just happens to involve sex.  Yet when you see some of them interviewed, they look like real sleaze balls.  After the emergence of AIDS and the death of John Holmes, they again try to make it look as a caring profession.  If the claims of Deep Throat star Linda Lovelace are true, that the film was financed by the Mafia and they had thugs on hand to make sure nobody backed out or caused any problems.  She claimed that to do some scenes she had a gun put to her head to remind her who was in charge.  As Wossy once said, "It leaves a nasty taste in the mouth, figuratively speaking!"