Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 9, 1995 TAG: 9508090055
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MIKE HUDSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
William Kopcial has owned W.R. Brews, a restaurant and bar in Roanoke, for almost 14 years.
"I run a beer joint, but still ...," he says, letting his sentence trail off.
He says he shouldn't have to put up with what goes on next door along Williamson Road: There's a sex-video store just a few dozen feet away. He believes it's hurting his business. Patrons of the video store park in his lot and pester his customers, he claims.
"This is just a cesspool," Kopcial complained to Roanoke's Board of Zoning Appeals on Tuesday. "Slime is all it is."
But board Chairman Richard Rife said the board couldn't do anything about that, no matter what the personal feelings of its members.
The question before the board was whether the business, Video World at 3745 Williamson Road N.W., was violating the city zoning ordinance.
The board ruled 3-0 that the video store was operating legally thanks to a "grandfather" exemption.
The store's attorney acknowledges that it violates current zoning restrictions. But the board ruled the store had been "grandfathered in" because it opened in 1980, a few weeks before new zoning rules were written into the city code.
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that obscenity is not protected by the First Amendment. But the court has made it difficult for law enforcers to prove that a magazine, book, video or movie is obscene.
The court has said that a free society should not limit any form of expression just because it seems unorthodox or distasteful. To be obscene, the court has said, materials must appeal to a "prurient interest" in sex; fly in the face of community standards; and completely lack literary, artistic, political or scientific value.
The case decided by the zoning appeals board Tuesday didn't involve obscenity allegations - it had to do only with zoning questions.
It began this spring when City Zoning Administrator Evelyn Dorsey informed Video World's owner, Dimitrious Farmakis, that he was in violation of Roanoke's zoning ordinance.
Because he had dropped the sale of sexually explicit magazines, Dorsey said, Farmakis had changed the nature and scope of his business enough over the years to lose his grandfather exemption. Without the exemption, he would run afoul of the code section that forbids adult video stores from operating within 500 feet of a school or residential area. The video store is near Breckinridge Middle School.
But Farmakis said his business has changed little since his brother opened it 15 years ago. "Nothing has changed since that day," he told the zoning board.
The 8mm films are gone, but they have given way to VHS videos for sale or rental. There still are sex toys and other paraphernalia for sale and booths in the back where customers can watch snippets of sex movies for a quarter.
He acknowledged that the store no longer sells magazines; adult video store owners in the city agreed to stop selling them in 1985 as part of a plea agreement over obscenity charges filed by Roanoke prosecutors.
Sam Garrison, an attorney representing Farmakis, said Farmakis doesn't deny that he sells sexually explicit materials. But, Garrison said, Farmakis is operating legally.
Farmakis did not want to comment in detail after the hearing.
Kopcial, the owner of W.R. Brews, said he plans to keep fighting the video store.
He said the innocuous sign out front, "Video World," often fools people: They think it's a regular video store and will go in with their kids to rent something. Kopcial said people from the store scare his customers away by propositioning them.
"I don't care what they do - as long as they don't affect me," he said. "And it's starting to affect my business."
by CNB