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MONTREAL, December 14, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) – A Montreal filmmaker who specializes in gory sexually explicit special effects is facing charges of corrupting morals by the distribution of obscene materials.

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Remy Couture’s website came to the attention of Interpol in 2006, because it contains images and videos of horrific realism. The international police service began an investigation after an Austrian pathologist suggested they might depict actual torture and murders. The RCMP then became involved.

The case was handed over to the Montreal police, who arrested Couture after tricking him to come out of his residence.

Sergeant Detective Eric Lavallée testified that he decided against approaching Couture’s dwelling directly, because the nature of the crime made him concerned for the safety of his men.

Montreal police arrested the 35-year-old Couture on charges of producing, possessing, and distributing obscene material.

Under such headings as “Hook,” “Burn,” “Sacrifice,” “Suicide,” and “Necrophile,” Couture’s website—named “Inner Depravity” and now removed from the internet—showed photos of naked women being tortured, mutilated, and sexually assaulted.

Jurors in the trial were shown photos from the website and two short videos named Inner Depravity 1 and Inner Depravity 2, where the closing credits list Couture as director, special effects artist and “psychopath.”

The jury of seven women and five men asked that the length of time each image was displayed be reduced from 10 to 5 seconds, according to a National Post report.

The trial began on December 11. A verdict is expected within two weeks.

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Canada’s Criminal Code defines obscene material as characterized by “the undue exploitation of sex” or a combination of sex with crime, cruelty, torture, or violence.

While Couture has entered a plea of not guilty, claiming his material is art, Crown prosecutor Michel Pennou argued that the material Couture posted on his website crossed the line of legality because of the combination of pornography and violence.

Pennou said the images Couture produced were an attack on “fundamental Canadian values.”

An expert witness brought in by the Crown said Couture’s images could prompt people to imitate the crimes depicted.

Neil Malamuth, a professor of psychology and communication at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an expert in the harmful effects of pornography, told the court that violent pornography “may have negative or harmful effects on consumers,” including “greater acceptance of violence against women, emotional desensitization to aggression and increased proclivity to aggress, particularly sexually aggress.”

In a report on the photos and the two videos, entered as evidence in the trial, Malamuth described the sexual violence depicted by Couture as “extreme.”

“These materials often portray sexual images and acts embedded within or merged with extreme acts of violence, including murder, mutilation and body dismemberment,” Malamuth wrote, pointing out that the images “portray the man as looking very powerful while completely controlling helpless, suffering, viciously tortured, and dismembered women.”