Another legal kafuffle showing serious lack of perspective

[Goofball]

Man, and I thought 10 years for a consensual round of hummer was harsh.

This woman has been convicted of exposing minors to porn and now faces up to 40 years in prison. Now, let's forget for a moment that the case against her is dubious at best, and the jury seems to have convicted her based on a knee-jerk reaction, as (from what is described in the article at least) there is certainly reasonable doubt as to whether she intended to expose the kids to porn in the first place. As far as I can see, her most serious offence is not being very Internet savvy.

But 40 years? I could rape and murder a seventh grader and be out of jail in less time than that.

Now, the judge hasn't passed sentence yet but I will be anxious to see: will he show a modicum of common sense and let her off with a suspended sentence, or will he give her 40 years "for the kids?"

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17134607/

[Marshal Murat]

Ooops! Sorry about kicking you man, it's a reaction to
bullfeces

It's to bad about the situation.
I really disliked the quote about 'unplugging it or throwing a coat over it'.
What substitute is carrying around a coat? Would she know how to unplug a monitor? There are alot of cables back there.

[Xiahou]

John Newsone, a defense attorney in Norwich familiar with the case, said Amero might be spared prison or face perhaps a year to 18 months.

That sounds a little more reasonable. No matter what kind of technophobe you are, how tough is it to turn off a monitor?

[drone]

I'm sure this generation's seventh graders have seen much worse than what popped up on the screen. If they don't already know how to access pr0n on the web at that age, they need to take remedial computer classes.

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

Prison for showing kids porn? That's utterly ridiculous.

What's next, hard time for dad because little Jimmy found his Playboys?

[Blodrast]

It seems utterly ridiculous to me that so many people cannot comprehend the simple fact that if you have a computer running windows connected to the Internet, and you don't use a firewall and a whole bunch of anti-malware software, yeah, you'll get a lot of malware, including popups, including porn. I mean, are all the jurors, the judge, and everybody else involved, completely ignorant about the 'net and what it's all about ? C'mon, gimme a break.

If there's one thing she's guilty of, is not turning it off (either the monitor, or the whole thing).
Nothing else. Ridiculous.
Unless the prosecuter can prove that she intentionally installed pr0n popups on that machine, it's not her fault at all - unless she was supposed to be responsible, and in charge of, keeping that computer up to date with firewalls, anti-malware software, etc (which obviously was not the case).

[Crazed Rabbit]

40 years is absurd (and would make her wish she had taken up a life of killing and kidnapping people in Germany instead), but I'm going to wait until the actual sentencing takes place before getting mad.

As Xiahou pointed out - it isn't that hard to turn off a computer screen, is it?

CR

[Blodrast]

As a side note, I have seen/met many people whose mentality with respect to computers, or other similarly complicated modern appliances (receivers, amplifiers, etc), was "No, you do it, I don't know how to work that thing", and they would literally not touch it because "they didn't know how to use it". I've also seen slightly more knowledgeable people, who, while able to click around and start their browser, the moment they are supposed to do something else, that they've never done before, suddenly turn into dummies, and have no clue about it.

In either case, since she IS a teacher, she should have been even more knowledgeable about the whole thing, than just shutting off a monitor. Otherwise she shouldn't have been permitted to use the damn thing.

[Hosakawa Tito]

I guess this is an extreme example of what can happen when one puts their fate in the hands of a jury, as opposed to a trial before a jurist. Hopefully the judge will impose a more reasonable sentence.

[InsaneApache]

Prison for showing kids porn? That's utterly ridiculous.

What's next, hard time for dad because little Jimmy found his Playboys?

It beggers belief doesn't it?

The worlds just arse about face IMO.

[Strike For The South]

Im sure these kids are going to be scarred for life. My God it was an accident give the gal a break

[KukriKhan]

Principal Scott Fain said the computer lacked the latest firewall protection because a vendor’s bill had gone unpaid. “I was shocked to see what made it through,” he said.

There's the guilty (or at least more culpable) guy. 40 years = travesty of justice.

[Vladimir]

We all know who is to blame.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

IE

[Fisherking]

Why did this even go to trial!

Turn it off or not…She was likely in panic mode and not thinking clearly, kids saw pictures…OMG.

The prosecutor is bored or just sick…

Does it mean that if Billy walks in on mom & dad that they could get 40 years?

[BDC]

How silly.

Bet the judge was looking at porn on their laptop during the boring bits of the trial too.

[Incongruous]

Why don't people just put Bill Gates in jail for selling complete crap?

(is immediatley shot in the back of the head by MS SS)

[Fisherking]

A Jury heard this and convicted?
What happened here?
It all sounds too incredible to me. There must be something more to this!

Principal Scott Fain said the computer lacked the latest firewall protection because a vendor’s bill had gone unpaid. “I was shocked to see what made it through,” he said.

That should have gotten it off the docket.

“What is extraordinary is the prosecution admitted there was no search made for spyware — an incredible blunder akin to not checking for fingerprints at a crime scene,” Alex Eckelberry, president of a Florida software company, wrote recently in the local newspaper. “When a pop-up occurs on a computer, it will get shown as a visited Web site, and no ‘physical click’ is necessary.”
Don't blame here as the only tech idiot…there are a lot more of them.

I only hope it is overturned on appeal….what a waste of government time and money to get a convection…not to mention that this should be more of an harassment case on her behalf.


I would also add that both judge and jury need to be bared from court and have their heads examined….but they would screw that up too.

[English assassin]

I blame the prosecutors. Everyone knows that juries can do very odd things. That's why you have a duty only to put cases of a certain quality before them. How on earth this ever got to trial I can't imagine. On the one hand, you have the entirely plausible explaination that students using the computer inadvertantly caused it to instal a porn pop up. On the other hand you have the, err, "slightly less plausible" scenario that a 40 year old supply teacher suddenly decided to go postal and show her class for the day a load of porn, because, its not as if anything would happen if she did, is it?

Hmm, tough call. I bet you have to go to law school for a lot of years before you can decide between those two.

Mr Prosecutor should be sacked.

[Fisherking]

I blame the prosecutors. Everyone knows that juries can do very odd things....

Mr Prosecutor should be sacked.

Not just the DA (any thing you want to make of those initials) but his boss who gave him the case and everyone that didn't demand it be dropped in the whole office I would say.

[Andres]

Mr Prosecutor should be sacked.

Not only that. He should get sued for wasting tax money.

Or better, make him pay for all the expenses related indirectly or directly with case.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Including my waste of working hours while posting this

[Gregoshi]

Who brought up the charges? It is quite ridiculous that it ever got to trial. It is easy for all the hindsighters to say "she should have done this", but it can be rather unnerving when the unexpected happens, especially in a setting such as school. There is lots of nasty stuff out there on the internet and some of it comes in the guise of innocence - the "whitehouse" website springs to mind. Once I did a Google search for "topographical maps" and was getting porn links. Go figure. It ain't too hard to take a wrong turn on the internet.

[KukriKhan]

Here are the state statutes that were 'violated' by the sub-teacher. Scanning through them, one can see how easy it might be to 'prove' a violation of the 'promotion' sections, in a courtroom. All Mr. Prosecutor had to show, was:

-porn was displayed
-multiple times (more than twice), to
-the same 'audience', of
-underage viewers

Boom. Proved (and probably stipulated by the defense).

Badly-crafted, overly-broad law. I begin to suspect that the State DA is pushing this as a trial case to go forward on appeal, hoping to get the law struck down by the Feds.

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

Badly-crafted, overly-broad law. I begin to suspect that the State DA is pushing this as a trial case to go forward on appeal, hoping to get the law struck down by the Feds.

I'm not sure this would be much of a comfort to the distressed school teacher, if it were the case.

[KukriKhan]

I'm not sure this would be much of a comfort to the distressed school teacher, if it were the case.

Indeed. Being a sub, she's probably not a member of the deep-pockets teachers' union, and her civil liberties aren't at stake, so the ACLU has no brief. Some other group is gonna have to fund her legal fees, until it gets overturned.

One hopes she gets clued in on the real intent, if my conspiracy theory is correct.

[BDC]

I came up with porn quite regularly researching biology a-level stuff.

Apparently 'trampling' is a fetish. People worry me.

[AntiochusIII]

And the mother who completely destroyed three of her children's lives through her psychotic behavior got put on trial with a limit at five years?

Eh, nice world we live in.

[BDC]

And the mother who completely destroyed three of her children's lives through her psychotic behavior got put on trial with a limit at five years?

Eh, nice world we live in.

That's ok, that's just driving them mad.

Showing them naked flesh though... That sends them to hell as well. ;)

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I think thsat's a bingo BDC.

This should never have gone to trial, clearly, and when it did the judge should have thrown it out.

[Rameusb5]

It wasn't even her computer? How in the world could it be construed that SHE showed them Porn?

I'd love to send some malware to the prosecutors computer that pops up pornography when his kids are on and have his ass prosecuted.

This is beyond stupid. Any one of the children could have shown that she didn't WANT them to see the images.

How nieve can our legal system be?


PS- I live in a city where we threw a grandmother in jail becuase she fed a parking meter of a stranger in front of a cop who was getting ready to write a parking ticket.

That's right. She went to jail.