By GREG RISLING
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES - A prosecutor told a jury Wednesday that a businessman should be convicted under U.S. obscenity laws because the pornographic movies he distributes are offensive and extreme.

The government and defense outlined their case in opening statements in the trial of Ira Isaacs, who was indicted on charges including importation or transportation of obscene material for sale.

Defense attorney Roger Jon Diamond said he plans to call a psychiatrist to testify that 9 percent to 10 percent of people are interested in the fetishes depicted, and that the films do have value in society.

The jury will be shown the movies, which depict bestiality and fetishes involving feces and urine. The panel includes eight men and six women. Two will be designated as alternates later in the trial.

Federal prosecutors think they can prove that Isaacs' movies violate community obscenity standards, even in the Los Angeles area, the reputed U.S. pornography capital.

The case is the most visible effort of a new federal task force designed to crack down on smut in America. Isaacs, however, says his work is an extreme but constitutionally protected form of art.

"There's no question the stuff is disgusting," said Diamond, who has often represented pornographers. "The question is, should we throw people in jail for it?"

Isaacs, 57, a Los Angeles advertising-agency owner who says he used to market fine art in commercial projects, says he went into distributing and producing films about fetishes because "I wanted to do something extreme."

"I'm fighting for art," he said in an interview before his federal trial got under way.

He plans to testify as his own expert witness and said he will cite the historic battles over obscenity involving authors James Joyce and D.H. Lawrence.

One of his exhibits, he said, will be a picture of famed French artist Marcel Duchamp's "Fountain," a porcelain urinal signed by the artist in 1917.

The test of obscenity in the United States still hinges on a 1973 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that held that a work is not legally obscene if it has "literary, artistic, political or scientific value."

Jurors also are asked to determine whether the material in question violates standards of what is acceptable to the community at large.

Each of the four counts against Isaacs carries a five-year maximum prison sentence. Prosecutors also are seeking forfeiture of assets obtained through his video sales. Two of the original six counts were dropped.

Linda Deutsch contributed to this report.