“A couple who says their 4-year-old daughter saw hard-core pornography on a PG-rated movie tape from Blockbuster has sued the video company.” The lawsuit, filed in New Jersey, says the rental chain “had a responsibility and a duty to inspect, monitor and ensure the quality and propriety of all video products purchased by its customers.” Blockbuster spokesman Randy Hargrove said “that the company does not carry X- or NC-17-rated movies, and depends on renters to return a tape ‘in the same condition it was given to them.’ ‘Unfortunately there are those rare instances when someone will abuse that privilege and damage one of our tapes,’ he said.” (“Blockbuster sued for porn on PG movie”, AP/CNN, Jan. 24). Reader Jeff Rowes writes: “I haven’t read the complaint, only the CNN story, but the theory of recovery seems to be that Blockbuster has a duty to review every videotape returned after renting to ensure that its contents have not been adulterated with pornography. If adopted, this duty of care would obviously jeopardize Blockbuster’s business because each outlet would need dozens of full time videotape reviewers (or some expensive, as-yet-uninvented technology). It would also create an explosion in fraud as all one would need to recover is a Blockbuster video with a few minutes of porn on it.”
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