Misdemeanor Plea Ends Norwich Pornography Case

An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from the Hartford Courant: "Almost 18 months after a pornography conviction that could have sent her to jail for 40 years was thrown out, former Norwich substitute teacher Julie Amero plead guilty to a single charge of disorderly conduct Friday afternoon. The plea deal before Superior Court Judge Robert E. Young in Norwich ends a long-running drama that attracted attention from around the world. ... She had originally been charged with 10 counts of risk of injury to a minor and later convicted on four of them. ... In June of 2007, Judge Hillary B. Strackbein tossed out Amero's conviction on charges that she intentionally caused a stream of 'pop-up' pornography on the computer in her classroom and allowed students to view it. Confronted with evidence compiled by forensic computer experts, Strackbein ordered a new trial, saying the conviction was based on 'erroneous' and 'false information.'"

Comments

About Time

[digitrev]

Although I'm kind of curious what the charge of disorderly conduct was for.

Re:About Time

[kobaz]

It's about "making an example" rather than finding the truth and having the case dismissed entirely.

Re:About Time

[TheGavster]

That was so that the justice system could point to something and say "See! She IS a deviant! We didn't incarcerate an innocent and waste everyone's time and taxdollars over something that is frivolous by inspection!".

Re:About Time

[rtfa-troll]

I'm not sure it's really so much "making an example" as avoiding any compensation claims. She's been unfairly prosecuted. Everything the prosecutor said outside the court could have been sued over since, if she was innocent, it would have been proven slanderous. Now she has one charge and an easy risk of getting into more trouble if she opens up any further court action. I think it's more about protecting one particular prosecutor by keeping her out of the way than any particular global message.

Re:About Time

[kobaz]

I agree that could very well be... But we all know that society's stance on "adult content" is ridiculous.

Had the teacher's computer shown pictures of guns, or someone getting maimed from styleproject, this would have never gone to court. If it had gotten any media attention at all, it would have been 10 seconds on the nightly news about a computer mishap.

Re:About Time

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

"Casting doubt on the effectiveness of state apparatus".

I'm joking, of course; but it seems that, if your case has made the system look sufficiently foolish, you can't be allowed to get away completely.

Re:About Time

[maz2331]

Actually, there are prosecutors and cops out there who will keep going after every case until they get "something" out of it. Even after an acquittal, they will basically put the defendant under a microscope and keep dragging them in on new charges until they get some sort of a guilty plea or conviction.

This is really common with organized crime prosecutions, with John Gotti being a textbook example. It took several tries, but they did finally get him.

Re:About Time

[lysergic.acid]

this is a clear case of criminal negligence. and i'm not talking about the teacher. i'm talking about the judge, the police, and the prosecutor who, either through malice or incompetence, tried to lock an innocent woman up for 40 years.

at the very least they should be fired from their posts. anyone with even the slightest shred of reason and experience using a computer could see how idiotic it is punish someone for browser pop-ups she had no control over. if anything, it should be the site owners who use pornographic pop-ups with indiscretion or install adware/malware on the computers of unsuspecting users who should have been put on trial.

if a teacher can be tried for unprofessional/disorderly conduct and lose her teaching license based on things which she had no reasonable control over, then those involved in the earlier case decision can certainly be fired for their actions which they had full conscious control over, and which have actually resulted in real harm--ending the career of an innocent school teacher and generally ruining her life.

the scary thing is, the state's attorney still thinks she should have been put away. and that guy is still the New London County state's attorney.

Re:About Time

[British]

I'm curious what they are making an example of. It seems that the gross IT incompetence at the school is now getting other people possibly sent to jail, even if they didn't do anything. You have to love computers in schools. They have un-maintained PCs, you have no authority to do anything, and no waiver you can sign saying you can't be sued for any damages. But if a porn pop-up happens and you're within 3 feet of it, you're busted.

Re:About Time

[91degrees]

I agree but for different reasons. Either they thought she deserved a 40 year penalty and have decided to let her off, or they didn't think she deserved that and used a baseless threat to intimidate her.

I can sort of see the argument for plea bargaining down from murder to manslaughter (still disagree but that's a completely different point), but plea bargaining down from 40 years to a minor misdemeanor makes a mockery of the law.

Re:About Time

[Lost Engineer]

Interesting you bring up manslaughter. Murder in this country can get you life or probation depending on how the prosecutor chooses to view your situation. The response to some of this has been to legislate minimum sentences, which, probably contributed to the 40 year possible sentence in this debacle.

Re:About Time

[GigaplexNZ]

But we all know that society's stance on "adult content" is ridiculous.

Well, guns aren't prohibited from minors viewing them, and I don't seem to remember anything about gore...

That was exactly kobaz's point. Sex is not illegal but showing pictures of sex to minors is. Shooting someone with a gun is illegal, but showing pics of someone shooting someone else to minors is not.

Re:About Time

[jafiwam]

It's called "saving face" in other cultures.

Offer up something that makes the DA "right" but is also harmless enough the alleged perp will agree to.

If the perp accepts the guilty charge for the small thing, the chances of ending up in civil court are much smaller. The perp not accepting the charge, of course could ultimately ind up in supreme court.

The sad thing is, everybody who figures out this was a bogus charge, already knew it was from the start.

Many people supposedly "in charge" of this country are still very clueless about technology (and ways it can fail).

Justice Still Not Done

[JimMcc]

The courts say that evidence was flawed. They through out that case as clear cut abuse. And what does the DA do? The say they'll charge here again.

So in order to avoid further embarrassment they "let her off" with a charge of disorderly conduct.

She still got screwed for something she was a victim of!

Re:Justice Still Not Done

[Repossessed]

Not only did they go after her again, but they refused to go after the cop who lied in court about the forensic evidence, and the prosecutors who suppressed a state forensic report that concluded the popups were from spyware.

Re:Justice Still Not Done

[MightyMartian]

Par for the course in the justice system. There's a cronyistic network set up to protect bad cops, bad judges and bad prosecutors. If there's one reform I'd like to see, it should be that if someone if falsely convicted based on bad evidence, the cops, prosecutors and judge involved should be forced to serve that person's *full* sentence instead, while that person collects their wages and pensions. Make this sort of thing so horrifyingly damage for bad cops and lawyers that they'll do what they're supposed to do, and presume innocence.

Re:Justice Still Not Done

[Atlantis-Rising]

That is one of the more moronic things I've heard in a while, and every so often, it keeps coming up again.

Firstly, cops and lawyers are not supposed to presume innocence. The justice system is, and the Court as an entity is supposed to presume it at a trial, but the prosecutors have no such limitation. Cops, of course, have nothing to do with guilt or innocence at all, really. The presumption of innocence is a legal theory for how defendants are supposed to be treated... but the whole point of the court system is that you throw evidence before a Court and see what sticks. That's what it's doing.

Secondly, your idea, like many others that have come before it, would cripple the justice system to no appreciable gain. The Court as an entity is designed to be independent so that there are limited or no repercussions of arriving at a specific judgment- specifically so that it will not be constrained as you are suggesting.

Re:Justice Still Not Done

[sjames]

but the whole point of the court system is that you throw evidence before a Court and see what sticks. That's what it's doing.

The instant a prosecutor or cop attempts to bury exculpatory evidence or fabricate damning evidence, they cross the line and become criminals themselves. There is a certain justice in them facing exactly the criminal sanctions they unjustly tried to push upon an innocent citizen.

At the very least, they should never work in the fields of justice or law enforcement again.

A prosecutor's job is to get the guilty convicted, not simply to get convictions at any cost. While there should be a high threshold of proof to convict a prosecutor or cop, fabricating evidence or suppressing exculpatory evidence should meet that threshold.

Re:Justice Still Not Done

[arashi no garou]

Though I will agree that "power junkie" cops exist, I must say that you grossly misunderstood the meaning behind my emphasis. It's the same kind of "need" to do your job well and proper that anyone who excels at their profession should feel. Would you want a house designed by an architect who didn't care whether the floors and walls fell in on you within a month?

It's that desire to do the best you can do that separates a good cop from the rest. Yes, the power junkie type sometimes do a great job too, but they almost always fall victim to the power trip eventually.

I will say, too, that time and again I've seen investigators do the right thing and back off a suspect when it's obvious they aren't guilty. It literally makes no sense to continue to follow false leads, power trip or not.

As for your bonus compensation theory, well in my department detectives don't get any compensation beyond the annual cost of living raise. Bonuses don't exist in a government job, at least not on the county level; you're trying to apply capitalistic values to a government entity and it doesn't work that way. They do get "Detective of the Month" plaques for solving particularly difficult cases, and in my opinion they are well deserved.

And just so we're clear on my personal stake: I'm not a cop, never been one and don't want to be. I'm literally not enough of an asshole to be one. I was told that by a supervisor early in my career in law enforcement and I wasn't offended at all. I know it's not in my blood to be one and I'd be a lousy one if I tried. I'm neither a cop-hater nor a cop groupie; I do my job (communications) and I'm damn good at it, and the guys and gals I work with are, for the most part, good cops. I've known a few bad ones too over the years, and I have no truck with that type. I'll call out a bad cop in a heartbeat, as will any of my coworkers. We don't like that shit in our ranks.

wait what

[Brian Gordon]

Don't tag this suddenoutbreakofcommonsense! Some poor teacher was just convicted of a misdemeanor for something that she had no control over.

Re:wait what

[cob666]

I don't recall there being any evidence that she was surfing questionable websites after hours. Also, she was a substitute teacher so how come nobody was looking at what the real teacher was doing with that computer after hours.

Re:wait what

[Anonymous Coward]

because many teachers are drowning in apathy

Many teachers are drowning apathy because they're powerless to deal with shithead kids and their shithead "me-first" baby-boomer parents who are too busy with their careers and reliving their youth to get off their asses and take responsibility for their shithead kids' actions as well as teaching their kids to be responsible for their own actions. Don't blame the teacher for the fuckups of yourself and your shithead kids.

Re:wait what

[Ant P.]

not our problem

What a shining example you set.

Re:wait what

[EastCoastSurfer]

Since when was the truth flamebait?

Travesty

[Rinisari]

This is still a travesty of justice. Disorderly conduct and neutering her of her source of income is terrible for something of which she had no control.

Re:Travesty

[digitrev]

Well excuse her for being a little bit dumbstruck at the sudden appearance of porn on the computer screen that she isn't in charge of. Would you and I have turned it off immediately? Of course. If it was a Windows box, we both would have hit Windows+D in a split second, hiding the damn thing and then close it through the Task Manager. However, Ms. Amero is a substitute teacher, and probably not very tech savvy. Give her a break.

Re:Travesty

[0xdeadbeef]

Two digit ID, think of the children whargarbl...

Holy crap, the trolls have sleeper cells!

Re:Travesty

[maxume]

Suspending her from working in that school system for a couple of months would be a slap on the wrist.

Bringing in the DA was reactionary.

Re:Travesty

[TerranFury]

You used the phrase, "protect kids in their care." The court used the phrase "risk of injury to a minor." Will people please stop this disingenuous rhetoric? What injury was risked? "Mental trauma" associated with seeing boobies? From what did these children need protecting?

The 'poor little children' involved were 7th graders. That makes them about 13 years old, which puts some of them at the beginning and some of them at the middle of puberty. Now look at some data which indicates that the median age of first intercourse in the U.S. is just under 17, and realize that if that's the median, then half of people first had sex earlier than this, and there is likely a non-negligible portion of the histogram that is nonzero at the 7th grade level.

For many of the children in that classroom, do you really believe that this was their first exposure to porn?

Now let's look at the balance of harms. On the one hand, we have a woman who lost her job and, in all likelihood, her ability to teach anywhere else ever again. And on the other -- some pubescent students saw things a good portion of them have likely already seen anyway.

So was this really fair?

Re:Travesty

[legirons]

The real question is: which of the programs or websites was responsible for showing porn to children?

Bonus question for the prosecutor to answer: who wrote that program or website?

Re:Travesty

[cj51]

iirc Amero was given instructions on using the computer from another teacher who also told her not to turn the computer off "under any circumstances". This is what I recall reading 18 month ago. I believe somebody tried to play a joke on her, but I have not heard that it entered into the investigation.

Re:Travesty

[rta]

i'm no fan of most teachers' grievances & teachers unions but this woman was thrown to the dogs for no good reason.

a) I'm not sure what circles you run in, but being convicted of anything more than a speeding ticket is pretty serious in today's society unless you are a superstar of some sort (sports, politics, movies, etc). This is especially true if you're dealing with children or money.

b) losing one's teaching credentials is a big deal when one is a teacher. Hopefully she'll find some private school that isn't encumbered by the whole credential process to hire her, but i wouldn't hold my breath. In spite of your claims this single incident says virtually nothing about her character, skill or ability to teach kids.

The proper level of "discipline" and "punishment" in this case should have been being talked to by the principal.

Re:Travesty

[MindlessAutomata]

And a better point is, which damage, exactly, is caused? Believe it or not, sex is not intrinsically "damaging" in the slightest. Attitudes toward sex, the same attitudes that caused this poor woman to be harassed, are what make any sight of sexual activity "damaging" by programming children to view sex negatively or as "forbidden" or something to hide and be ashamed of.

The mentality of the "justice" department and the prosecutor here have done far more damage to the teacher AND the "children" (12-13 year olds are not really that innocent, as you noted) involved.

Re:Travesty

[enzyme6]

I won't comment on whether or not this was fair or not... The whole thing seems fishy, but the teacher herself plead guilty to the misdemeanor for whatever reason.. Anyway, my comment is more in response to whether or not kids are harmed by sexual content.. Your argument is basically that since the median age for first intercourse in the US is 17, claims of harm caused by sexual content must be exaggerated if not false. My response, however, would be that environmental influence - specifically media influence - results in the median age of first intercourse being what it is: http://www.rand.org/news/press/2008/11/03/. If this is the case, then the question is whether there is anything wrong w/ the median age being what it is - 17. The argument here turns on your view on sex. Is sex something to be valued, or is it simply to be used for pleasure between any number of persons and any number of times? For me, sex is something to be enjoyed only in marriage. When sex is permitted outside marriage, there is really nothing more to it than the act itself. You have people taking advantage of each other for a period of time for the sake of pleasure and nothing else. It does nothing to develop the relationship between two people. This is why I would posit that sex at 17 is harmful. Kids are getting involved in things that they don't understand will affect them the rest of their lives. Do you think that when one person has sex and then almost flippantly moves on to the next, the first partner doesn't get hurt in the process? Do you think the act of sex does not lead to any emotional bonds?

Baka.

[girlintraining]

The sad part is that it took a bunch of forensic experts and a lot of taxpayer dollars several months to convince the court that pornography can appear in popups when browsing the internet that the user didn't explicitly ask for. This is just another reason why computer crimes need special courts to process cases -- the level of computer literacy amongst court officials is still very low, and at the risk of being yelled at for saying so... It's because many of these judges are at or past retirement age and haven't the inclination to learn.

Re:Baka.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is just another reason why computer crimes need special courts to process cases...

Nonsense. The problem is in the officers of the court. You'll either end up filling the computer crimes court with idiots, or if you figure out a way to get non-idiots in positions of power, you might as well do that for the regular courts.

The court officials are probably not geneticists either, yet presumably they deal with DNA evidence at least occassionally.

Re:Baka.

[Ian Alexander]

Wouldn't it be better just to require them to have a clue about computers instead of creating an extra-special court for one class of crime?

And, having spent some quality time in a district courthouse (hey, it was a series of field outings in a class on the Justice system!) I can tell you that the geriatric judge stereotype is just that- a stereotype. I never saw one under 30 but I didn't see any older than their early 50's.

Re:Baka.

[Alyred]

I work for a court as tech support. Many, many of our judges are as described: not inclined to learn the finer details of computers, and don't have the fundamental understanding of how computers work. But they are beginning to, as spam and spyware impacts them on a personal level, an understanding is slowly coming.

I believe that the problem, as was posted earlier, is that many of the judges are far past retirement age and not willing to start learning a whole new branch of knowledge. DNA evidence has an established record of working and has precedent in court, and while new (relatively speaking) doesn't change as quickly as computer technology does. Remember, spam was a nuisance 10 years ago; now it's what, 80 some percent of our world internet traffic? Spyware didn't exist 15 years ago; now you have to watch where you click because some companies will hold your machine ransom because you thought you clicked on a free virus scan.

Additionally, DNA and forensic evidence (for instance) deals with proving someone guilty of a specific crime, it's used as evidence to support crimes such as murder, kidnapping, or rape -- a much more personal, physical set of crimes with a limited scope that the technology applies to: defendant was or wasn't at the scene of the crime. Compared to computer and technology "crimes", of which computer technology evidence introduced into court could be literally anything from network protocol analysis to hard drive sector recovery, with different applications and results to each of those, it becomes evident that there's a much wider spectrum of facts and case law that needs to be established, and to be honest, a whole new branch of education that would need to be taken on for a judge to truly understand enough of the aspects to make informed decisions.

That is why they call experts to the stand, question them on the facts, and then move on.

Our younger judges that are coming on board, however, have a much better grasp on the technology side -- at least the usage of technology -- and I think will be able to tackle these kinds of cases in the coming years with more favorable results.

However, I still have one question. Why didn't the defense team introduce more forensic evidence showing how vile and pervasive spyware and spam can be? Or was it just that the jury didn't like that she didn't keep kids away from the screen while the spyware was popping up porn?

Re:Baka.

[Atlantis-Rising]

The reason is because it doesn't matter; the Court doesn't need to have perfect knowledge over all the subjects over which it governs.

The only case in which it is generally useful to set up special courts is where the law is very complicated or unusual- UCMJ appeals courts, tax courts, that sort of thing, because the law itself would not be something your average judge would know about in detail.

However, in the case of a simple trial like this, it is not the responsibility of the judge to be informed. It is the responsibility of the lawyers to inform the Court. A Court should not be making decisions on the basis of its own investigations, after all, at least not in an adversarial situation.

Re:New Meaning

[Jerry]

And the next time a porn picture pops up on your computer while you are trying to navigate to some kids site, while your childing are waiting and watching, shall we indict you for aiding and abetting the abuse of a minor?

Disgraceful DA

[adsl]

Looks as thought the Prosecution backed down 95%, which shows they really had no case. But the Prosecution still wanted a conviction on ANY charge and likely threatened to go back with all the Felony charges if this teacher did not agree. Faced with this option it's no wonder she took the smaller fall. But someone higher up the Justice chain needs to review this case as it looks as though the Prosecution used their office and FEAR as they means to get this last conviction. i.e. this looks like completely flawed use of the Justice system. The really bad people here were the school administrators, IMHO, who did not keep up-to-date which would have prevented the porn pop=ups. Why is the Prosecutors office ignoring the bigger crime and going after one teacher? That's insane and needs review IMHO. Meantime this teacher now has a criminal mrecord and a "prior" which will follow her for the rest of her life. Any job interview will mean she will have to detail the offense and her "arrest record".

Re:Disgraceful DA

[cob666]

Any job interview will mean she will have to detail the offense and her "arrest record".

Not exactly true, it depends on the wording of the application. If she is only asked for felony convictions then she doesn't have to list it. According to the Hartford Courant she plead to a misdemeanor disorderly conduct.

Re:Disgraceful DA

[jdc]

Maybe prosecutors need alternate "metrics for success"?

If my job performance was based on my percentage of successful convections and I knew I was assigned a looser case, it's up to me to think of alternate ways to succeed at my job

A system that encourages this behavior is totally broken

Re:New Meaning

[shrubya]

Obviously I'm new here compared to a 2-digit ID, but come on and RTFA.

She was a SUBSTITUTE teacher. There is no possible way that a substitute could download, install, and run an anti-malware app in the handful of minutes notice she had before classes began. Even if she were allowed to install apps onto school PCs, which is unlikely.

If this were a man,

[Anonymous Coward]

there wouldn't have been any chance for a plea bargain. The poor bastard would have been lynched.

Re:If this were a man,

[TerranFury]

The body of psychological evidence indicates that children are suggestible, that memory is malleable, and that kids will report sexual abuse even when it did not occur. I'm remembering a famous experiment described in intro psychology courses: The setup was this: A toddler was taken into a mock doctor's office for a "checkup," in which the experimenter did nothing more than tie a small red string around the child's finger; this was videotaped by a hidden camera. Then, the child was interviewed in the manner common in sex-abuse legal cases at the time, in which she was presented with a doll and asked to indicate whether the doctor had touched her, and where. After repeated, gentle, innocuous-seeming questioning, the child reported obscene things that I could have not come up with myself; among other things, she reported that the doctor had rammed a stick into her vagina, which she pantomimed violently (the interview was also videotaped). What seems to have happened is that she responded subliminally to subtle, unintentional cues from the interviewer, and reported whatever the interviewer was afraid to (or wanted to?) hear. It's essentially the same phenomenon as what occurred with Clever Hans, the horse that could "do arithmetic." The horse was posed questions in the form of marks on the ground, and would tap out the answer -- one tap to say "one," two taps to say "two," etc -- in response. It astounded all observers, but what was actually happening is that the horse was picking up on the crowd's reaction to his tapping: Tension would build as he approached the right number, and then immediately release; this is when he would stop. In any event, the point is that apparently cut-and-dry testimonies are anything but, and people -- especially, but not just, children -- are hugely suggestible, and can honestly remember things that never happened as a subliminal response to unintentional bias in the interviewer.

The conclusion you're forced to draw is that there are hundreds of innocent men now in jail for sex crimes, especially crimes against children, that they didn't commit. The sad irony is that sexual abuse really is now happening -- in jail, and these men are the victims.

Re:If this were a man,

[Frosty Piss]

The kind of thing you describe is why any intellegent person should think twice about going into teaching. It's just too risky.

Re:If this were a man,

[TerranFury]

The kind of thing you describe is why any intellegent person should think twice about going into teaching. It's just too risky.

I've heard other people say this as well, and there's an element of truth to it. Unfortunately, what does this do to society? What happens when children -- especially boys -- have no male coaches, mentors, scout leaders... because it was "too risky?" This kind of paranoia is destroying communities.

Re:If this were a man,

[TerranFury]

I'd originally googled before posting, but didn't find the name; I thought I'd refer to my old textbooks next time I had access. But your post motivated me to try some new search strings, and this time I've found it, I think (or at least similar studies).

I believe the study I am referring to was carried out by Ceci (Cornell) and Bruck (McGill). [If not them, then perhaps it was a study by Goodman (UC Davis).] You might want to refer to this paper. In particular, see the section on p. 10 titled "Anatomically Detailed Dolls;" the study it describes is not exactly the same as I remember, but similar.

Re:If this were a man,

[TerranFury]

It's not that they remember fictional events, they simply report fictional events. Big difference. The child is aware that it's a fabrication.

What makes you say this? What I've read indicates just the opposite -- that children, and eyewitnesses in general, can honestly remember things that never happened. Memory is fallible, and the mind fills in gaps without you consciously realizing it.

Re:New Meaning

[digitrev]

Doing a quick bit of research shows that they had a copy of Symantec WebNOT filter. However, their copy didn't have a license for updates, so they missed out on all the new porn that appears daily.

Re:Common sense?

[Sique]

That was one of the problems: The virus scanner was completely outdated at the school.

Misplaced priorities

[mrraven]

And if the kids had been exposed to violent images like a war that has killed a million people far from removing the kids from the room we'd have a fund raising drive to support the glorious war crime committing troops, right?

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/03/13/winter_soldier/

Where the fuck are our priorities?

Considering our society is committing war crimes and the economy is going down the drain I think the kiddies seeing a titty is the least of our worries. They are doing to learn where babies come from at some point, why are we so hung about that?

http://books.google.com/books?id=-A-7d-2VpwcC&pg=PA122&lpg=PA122&dq=Europe+nude+advertising&source=web&ots=Q9pqfc6bGy&sig=TMqCxpzJk3sOB5TXsvPNz9UH91M&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=3&ct=result

Americans need to grow up and get our priorities straight or we will continue to fall behind Europe and Asia and become a laughing stock country, no longer famous for tech but for puritan religious fanatics much like Iran.

Re:Misplaced priorities

[TerranFury]

Actually, we don't show graphic images from the war on the news. That's part of the problem. If we did, maybe people would be less inclined to support it.

Re:New Meaning

[electrogeist]

I didn't follow this closely but per a previous /. article http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/13/0753209

1) an expert found the computer was infected on a hairstyling site, not porn surfing

2) "Amero testified that she had told four other teachers and the assistant principal about the popups, but received no assistance. "

3) "The school's internet filtration software was not working because it's license had expired."

Whether she had the technical ability to install a cleansing tool I don't know, but many businesses and institutions these days have policies about installing anything without approval... It wouldn't suprise me if the school rules barred her from installing something to fix herself.

I also imagine she received better treatment than if she were a male

Re:New Meaning

[TerranFury]

I also imagine she received better treatment than if she were a male

Indeed. Had she been male, she'd be going door to door nowadays introducing herself as the friendly neighborhood sex offender.

erroneous and false conviction ..

[rs232]

"Amero was working on a very old Gateway PC running Windows 98, an extremely vulnerable setup .. Detective Mark Lounsbury .. admitted under cross-examination that the prosecution never even checked the computer for malware"

don't talk to cops

Injury to minor?

[nightfire-unique]

Does anyone else here find the term "injury to a minor" in this context extremely offensive? Is it not insulting to minors who are actually put at risk of injury?

Like, for example, by people threatening to expell a minor for having a plastic butter knife, or tylenol at school?

Convections?

[VirginMary]

> ... percentage of successful convections and I knew I was assigned...

From Dictionary.com:

convection [kuhn-vek-shuhn]:
-noun
1. Physics. the transfer of heat by the circulation or movement of the heated parts of a liquid or gas.
2. Meteorology. the vertical transport of atmospheric properties, esp. upward (distinguished from advection ).
3. the act of conveying or transmitting.

Why is America so easily traumatized?

[A12m0v]

a few porno pop-ups big deal, close them and move on with your life!
it's just like with Janet Jackson milk shake, the whole nation overreacted!

I'm embarrassed by stuff like this! why can't we be like one of them cool European countries, where people aren't too crazy about Jesus and there isn't a war on sex?

Re:Common sense?

[st0rmshad0w]

Adblock Plus? Are you daft? There should have been network based measures in place to defend against this type of crap.

My guess is they have effectively no IT department, especially given that they are using Windows 98 in classrooms when it is completely unsecurable, and seem to have zero protective measures in place or policies or teacher training.

More than a few people need a serious punch in the crotch over this and the poor woman needs to be cleared and reinstated and issued a full public apology.

Sends a clear message

[HangingChad]

Not only did they go after her again, but they refused to go after the cop who lied in court about the forensic evidence, and the prosecutors who suppressed a state forensic report that concluded the popups were from spyware.

It sends a clear message that our criminal "justice" system is seriously broken. And it sends the unintended message that if you're smart and have an option, avoid teaching or substitute teaching, don't volunteer for Scouts or church activities that have anything to do with young people. You could even take it to the extreme of refusing to help a child in distress or render aid if a parent isn't around, because where kids are concerned, law enforcement is totally off the reservation. Something like this incident or a false charge and you could be dragging an arrest record around the rest of your life. It's just not worth the risk. That used to be a paranoid attitude but it doesn't seem so paranoid today.

So the next time you're tempted to complain about a lack of math and science teachers, remember this incident. The only people willing to get involved will be other parents and, ironically, the predators.

Re:Sends a clear message

[quacking duck]

You could even take it to the extreme of refusing to help a child in distress or render aid if a parent isn't around, because where kids are concerned, law enforcement is totally off the reservation. Something like this incident or a false charge and you could be dragging an arrest record around the rest of your life. It's just not worth the risk. That used to be a paranoid attitude but it doesn't seem so paranoid today.

This has already happened. I can't and don't have more time find the story now, but IIRC in the UK a few years ago, a lone male motorist noticed a little girl wandering alone in the woods. He felt he should stop and make sure she was okay, but was worried that if someone (like her parents) came across the scene they'd get the wrong idea (or worse, the girl would get the wrong idea and run screaming to her parents) and he'd go through exactly what you described, so he went on his way.

Shortly after, the girl fell into a nearby river and drowned.

He felt terrible when the news broke and told his story afterwards, and opinions were fairly evenly divided between disgust at his inaction and agreeing with his line of thinking, which goes to show that by "Think[ing] of the children!" you're damned if you do and damned if you don't.

CIPA?

[st0rmshad0w]

Wouldn't the school be liable under CIPA?

Aren't they supposed to have monitoring and filtering in place?

Re:Sanctimony

[sjames]

I'd say the translation is more like "Id'a had her railroaded in a flash and a great notch in my belt if the damned media hadn't gotten involved. Still, I'm not at all sorry I tried, it's not like I'll ever face consequences for my actions!".

Not a fallacy and not helping people

[mrraven]

The million dead is not a fallacy, it's confirmed by scientific research:

"The number is shocking and sobering.
It is at least 10 times greater than most estimates cited in the US media, yet it is based on a scientific study of violent Iraqi deaths caused by the U.S.-led invasion of March 2003.
That study, published in prestigious medical journal The Lancet, estimated that over 600,000 Iraqis had been killed as a result of the invasion as of July 2006. Iraqis have continued to be killed since then. The graphic above provides a rough daily update of this number based on a rate of increase derived from the Iraq Body Count. (See the complete explanation.)
The estimate that over a million Iraqis have died received independent confirmation from a prestigious British polling agency in September 2007. Opinion Research Business estimated that 1.2 million Iraqis have been killed violently since the US-led invasion.
This devastating human toll demands greater recognition. It eclipses the Rwandan genocide and our leaders are directly responsible. Little wonder they do not publicly cite it."

http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq/iraqdeaths.html

Further the Iraq people don't want us there:

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/pollindex.htm

The unconscionable suffering of the Iraqi people and the quite literal trillion dollars down the drain counting long term healthcare of our soldiers and restocking military hardware most likely to steal their oil makes me angry and no I won't be quiet about it. That trillion dollars could have provided BOTH health care for all Americans AND a real high speed rail system like civilized places in Europe and Asia have. Instead we pissed away a trillion dollars killing a million people in a country where they don't want us there in first place.

Here is a further point SK the American people handed your point a of view a quite through drubbing in the elections, if I were you I'd look for a new set of talking points, American's aren't buying the interventionist line anymore when OUR own country is in such trouble. Goodbye interventionists, and good riddance!

Imagine THIS.....

[IHC Navistar]

Just imagine the penalty if this had been a male teacher who did that.

Kinda funny how you never hear Feminazis criticize the disproportionate penalties in sex crimes between men and women.