Teacher could get 40 years in prison. WTF?

At first read, this seems like the teacher did something bad.

Wow. 40 years. What did she do? Throw axes at the children? Show them how to make a bomb out of things found in the garage? Gym Class dodgeball using a pitching machine? Teach a class on ferret legging?

Nope, nope, nope and nope.

Her classroom computer had pop-ups that showed (are you sitting down?) naked people.

Linky

It isn’t like she didn’t try to stop it. From another article;

Because of the images this woman faces 40 years in jail? What the fuck is wrong with the USA? These kids aren’t scarred for life because of this. We’re talking about a 7th grade class. I’d place a bet 90% of the kids in this class have already seen such images. I’ll bet 0% of the children, after seeing the images, had a breakdown and went home crying. I’ll also bet none of the kids are having nightmares or will need therapy because of this.

What. The. Fuck?

Television in the states can show movies of people being blown up, burned, shot, stabbed, run over by cars, and beaten with clubs and fists. Of course, that’s all ok. But the minute you introduce a naked tit, you’ve got problems. (I remember seeing US televison show blur a dog penis once. Not an erect dog penis, just a run of the mill dog penis. A dog was getting trimmed and groomed and when it came time to shave around that area - the dirty, dirty area - they blurred it. Thank you for thinking of our children who would NEVER see such a thing walking down the streets of Anytown USA)

From this article we learn;

Ok. I’ll agree that the teacher visiting porn sites on a school computer is not a good thing to do. We can assume this was done out of classtime, but this still isn’t proper use of school property.

I’ll also agree that kids in school should constrain their porn browsing time as a home activity. I don’t know about schools in your area, but most I’ve seen have a firewall or blocking software to cut down on this sort of use.

Oh. Ooops.

If anything this should have been a school issue not a legal one. The school should have dismissed the teacher for using school property for porn viewing. Period.

I could understand some outrage if the teacher was showing the class porn sites as a “lesson”, but it sounds like her desk computer would spit out porn pop-ups. Hardly 40 years in prison worthy.

The United States has roots in Puritan fundamentals, but it is now 2007 and it’s time to grow up. Everyone has those dirty parts. Pretty much everyone has sex and gasp most enjoy it. Tits don’t kill people - people kill people.

The very sad part about this entire thing. I’d suspect if the woman walked up to a child in class and beat the child to death with a chair, the woman would be facing the same amount of jail time.

7th grade isn’t too young to have a sex education class. The subject has already been brought up, just take advantage of it. Instead of a felony generator, it’s an educational opportunity.

I’ll eat my shorts, hell, I’ll eat YOUR shorts if she gets 40 years. In my experience, the media always lokes to report the absolute maximum sentence, that is rarely if ever imposed. I’m guessing, since it is 4 counts, that the judge would have to sentence her to 10 years on each count, to run consecutively. No way in hell that’s happening.

Just wait until she’s actually sentenced to express your outrage.

No, the outrage here is that this made it to trial in the first place. This should have been dealt with internally. Fire her and be done with it. She has done no more harm to those kids than TV has. What a waste of time and money.

There will come a time, rather soon, that no one will be willing to be a teacher. That is sad.

Hamlet got it in two. My grandfather could be the Lindbergh baby, my Powerball ticket could win this week, and I could grow 18 inches this year and play in the NBA. Call me when one of those things actually happens.

How has she done any harm to the kids?

If you need someone to call you when any one of these things happens, at least let me hold your Powerball ticket for you.

I’ll call when it hits, I promise! :wink:

She hasn’t. Which was, y’know, kinda the point being made there.

I dunno what “ferret legging” is, but playing dodgeball with a pitching machine sounds kinda… cool.

But now that she’s convicted, isn’t she stuck with a sex offender label for LIFE?

Even if this is just an untruth derived from another site, isn’t any jail time (or maybe even any punishment) a hugely chilling effect on the use of computers in the classroom? After all, one does not need to be hugely careless to get porn popups on a computer…

Silenus is right. I think it’s wrong that she should even have to deal with the courts process, pay legal fees, and all that. Even if she’s given a minute sentence (or none at all,) the emotional and financial strain of going to court is too harsh a punishment for this.

It’s not the legal aspects of this that bothers me, it’s the moral panic.

The most she should get is to lose her job. And if it were my decision, I probably wouldn’t even go that far. This country is so fucked up sometimes.

My outrage is a two-parter.

The first being what I said above “If anything this should have been a school issue not a legal one. The school should have dismissed the teacher for using school property for porn viewing. Period.”

The second is that I even know about this. Really. It’s just nakedness in a pop-up on a computer on the internets. The fact this is even news says much about the prudeness of the United States. 7th graders catching a glance of naked pictures in a pop-up which the computer user doesn’t have the tech skills to stop isn’t and shouldn’t be a crime. The teacher wasn’t even showing these pictures to the kids - they were displaying on the computer all by their lonesome.

Ferret Legging - NSFW*

*Not Safe For Wiener

How could she have even been convicted? Porn pop-ups can come from spyware hidden in seeming innocuous banner ads. As the 3rd link sez "Defense computer expert W. Herbert Horner said that he found spyware on the PC, linked to a seemingly innocent hair styling website, “that led to this pornographic loop that was out of control”.

Why are people saying she should even lose her job? It sounds like the spyware got on her computer through no fault of her own, she asked for help and didn’t receive it, and then got thrown under the bus. Her punishment should be NOTHING.

When I was in the 8th grade a guy brought a hardcore porno to class and replaced the tape we were supposed to watch in history class with it. The teacher turned the lights off, said “Alright, everybody take notes,” and hit play. There were two people fucking right there on the big screen. The teacher was not censured at all. Firing this woman makes about as much sense as firing my 8th grade history teacher; convicting her is downright criminal.

Her life is ruined. Every member of the prosecution team should do jail time for this and every member of the jury should be punched in the face.

Nah, they should be forced to take up ferret legging.

As for the jury, they are instructed to make a decision based on the law. I would say that the law is ridiculous. But I have not seen it, so I cannot really make an informed decision about the jurors.
I think this case shows the bizarre laws that the USA has brought in.

I fully agree. If some kid did it, then it isn’t her fault. She tried to get it fixed, couldn’t, so went about doing what she needed on the computer - porn pop-ups or not.

In one of the articles they speculate she was the one surfing the porn to begin with. If that’s true, the school should take whatever steps they normally take in those situations. Given she’s a temp, I would assume she’d be asked to leave.

In any case, I think the whole thing is stupid. Four hour Ferret Legging for everyone involved.