Trick of Treat?: Texas man accused of handing out porn DVDs to children on Halloween

(Wise County)

Talk about trick-or-treat.

While Thanksgiving may be close at hand, residents in a small Texas town are still thinking about Halloween after a local man was arrested for passing out pornographic DVDs to trick-or-treaters.

Brad Collins, 32, was arrested earlier this month and charged with the sale, distribution or display of harmful material to minors – a class A misdemeanor. He posted $5,000 bond and was released from jail early last week.

Collins, however, told local media that the incident is all one big mistake and people are making a bigger deal out of the porn gaff than they should.

"I believe these allegations are being brought way out of proportion," Collins told WFAA.

Neighbors said that Collins was helping his community pass out Bible verses to trick-or-treaters as part of a 25-year-old tradition in Boyd – a town located an hour northwest of Dallas - where police close the street so thousands of children can collect candy safely.

"He was helping us pass out the Bible tracks and Bible stories and he wanted to do something to give a little more," said Collins’ neighbor James Arrington.

That something was handing out burned DVDs he had acquired, but purportedly not watched. He declined to say who gave him the DVDS.

"I told everyone to check them before they let their kids watch them," Collins said. "Just for the fact I was unsure of exactly what could be on there. It could be 'World of Warcraft;' it could be 'Happy Gilmore.' I didn't know."

When they got home, parents did check the DVDs and then quickly went to the police.

"They discovered there was graphic pornographic material on there," Boyd Police Officer Ryan Erwin said, adding that out of the dozens of DVDs Collins handed out, six of them contained X-rated material.

Erwin added: "They were his DVDs he was handing out so you have to assume he knew what was on them.”

Collins, a father himself, said that there was no “bad intent” and he would never have given the DVDs to children if he knew they contained pornographic material.

"There's no bad intent involved in it," Collins said.