Judge recuses himself from obscenity case

LOS ANGELES, June 13 (UPI) -- U.S. appeals court Judge Alex Kozinski Friday recused himself from a Los Angeles obscenity case, admitting he had sexually explicit material on his Web site.

The case before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in Los Angeles was suspended after the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday that the images and videos were posted to Kozinski's personal Internet site.

"In light of the public controversy surrounding my involvement in this case, I have concluded that there is a manifest necessity to declare a mistrial," Kozinski said. "I will recuse myself from further participation in the case and will ask the chief judge of the district court to reassign it to another judge."

Kozinski, the appeals court's chief judge, granted a 48-hour stay in the obscenity trial of a Hollywood adult filmmaker after the prosecutor requested time to explore "a potential conflict of interest concerning the court having a . . . sexually explicit Web site with similar material to what is on trial here," the newspaper reported.

Kozinski, who was appointed to the court by President Ronald Reagan in 1985, is considered a judicial conservative on most issues.