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By ROXANA HEGEMAN

The Associated Press

WICHITA -- An Abilene adult bookstore has sued Kansas, challenging a statute that restricts sexually-oriented businesses from advertising on outdoor signs near state highways.

The Lions Den Adult Superstore filed a federal lawsuit late Wednesday against Kansas Attorney General Stephen Six. The lawsuit argues that a state statute restricting the location of signs on state highways violates the Constitution's First and Fourteenth Amendments.

Under the statute, adopted by the Legislature in 2006, advertising billboards from sexually oriented businesses must be taken down before July 1. It also prohibits such businesses from putting up new signs.

On Thursday, the Lions Den also filed a separate motion asking the federal court for a temporary injunction prohibiting Kansas from enforcing the sign statute against it until final resolution of its lawsuit.

The lawsuit was filed by Abilene Retail No. 30, an Ohio corporation doing business as Lions Den Adult Superstore. The firm sued Six in his official capacity as state attorney general.

"The problem with this sign statute, among all the legal mumbo jumbo, is it is exactly the same statute we invalidated in Missouri a year and a half ago," Lions Den attorney Richard Bryant said in a phone interview.

That case initially lost in trial court but won its appeal to the U.S. 8th District Court of Appeals, Bryant said. The language in the Missouri and Kansas sign statutes are nearly identical.

The Kansas attorney general's office did not have immediate comment on the lawsuit.

"We contend -- and the 8th Circuit agreed on similar language -- that this particular type of law doesn't further any governmental interest, and clearly the only thing it was designed to do is suppress free speech," Bryant said.

The Kansas statute prohibits signs or other outdoor advertising for any sexually-oriented business within one mile of a state highway.

It allows a limited exception for on-site signs for such businesses located within a mile of a state highway. Those businesses are allow one sign giving notice the premises are off limits to minors and another identification sign limited to the name, address, phone and operating hours. The identification sign can also be no larger than 40 square feet.

Violation of the statute is a misdemeanor criminal offense punishable by confinement in the county jail not to exceed one month and a fine not to exceed $500.

The Lions Den has numerous signs on its premises and leases space on three billboards along Interstate Highway 70, store manager Sabrina Breeden said in an affidavit filed in the case.

The lawsuit notes similar state statutes have already been struck down in Missouri, Georgia and South Carolina.

The Kansas sign statute treats sexually oriented businesses differently than other businesses, which is a clear violation of the First Amendment, Bryant said.

It is also a Fourteenth Amendment due process violation because the company is being treated differently than other businesses, he added.

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