US District Judge Paul Maloney ruled that the parents of David Werking, 42, will have to pay for the stash of porn and sex toys belonging to their son that they destroyed, MLIve reported on Thursday.
Werking sued his parents, claiming that the property they tossed out was worth some $29,000.
“This was a collection of often irreplaceable items and property,” said Werking's attorney, Miles Greengard, cited in the story. "We have asked the Court for treble damages, which we believe are warranted given the wanton destruction of the property."
The story details that the parents insisted that they were acting as landlords when they trashed the porn stash, but the judge ruled that landlords do not have the right to destroy the property of their tenant.
According to MLive, Werking moved to his parent's home in 2016 after a divorce and expected them to ship his belongings to him after he was asked to leave for at least three days in 2017, but was then shocked to discover that "a dozen boxes of pornographic films and magazines" were missing.
Commenting on the disappearance, his father reportedly responded in an e-mail: “Frankly, David, I did you a big favor getting rid of all this stuff.”
The parents reportedly contended that he had abandoned the property, saying he could have mitigated his losses by removing it himself.
According to the judge, cited by the report, the parents would not let Werking back to their home, saying they would ship his belongings.
“There is no question that the destroyed property was David’s property,” Maloney said, according to the report. “Defendants repeatedly admitted that they destroyed the property."
The parents also claimed that some of the pornographic material, described in their experience as the "worst of the worst", was placed in a safety deposit box, fearing it could be illegal. According to the Holland Sentinel, among the items kept in the vault were depictions of sexual assault, slavery, incestuous relationships and sex with minors.
According to MLive, the Ottawa County Sheriff’s Department carefully reviewed the materials from the bank vault and found no evidence of child pornography.