Brenda Biesterfeld needs your help.

Brenda did something I hope all of us would have the courage to do...

She blew the whistle on a man at her local library who was viewing child porn on the public library computers. The police caught him in the act and arrested him. The authorities then searched his home and found more child pornography.

Two days after she reported the man, Brenda was fired! In fact, within hours of when she reported the man to the police, she
was reprimanded by her boss for invading his "privacy." And then, without warning, she was fired.

I am asking you to sign a Petition calling for Brenda’s immediate reinstatement -- along with a formal apology from Lindsay, California library officials. Go here:

http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894
http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894

Liberty Counsel has taken up Brenda's case and we have already sent a Demand Letter to Lindsay library officials. But now I need your help to show those officials and the national media that we will not tolerate this outrageous firing -- and we will not sit by quietly when local officials take the side of child pornographers!

Please sign the petition today. More information is posted on the petition site. The more you learn about this case, the more outraged you will be. It took great courage for Brenda to take such a strong stand against child porn in her library. We need more citizens like Brenda!
That's why we cannot allow this library to get away with persecuting her. Thank you for standing with Brenda:

<a href="http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894">
http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894

Your Pal,
Doc
8)

   Who the heck are these people, Doc?  Before I sign any petition, I'll attempt to gather more information from different sources...

   
   From LibertyAction.org:

   "Expose and defeat the ACLU"

   "Petition to Radio Disney: Don’t Ban God From Ads"

   "Help Empower Pastors To Speak Out During This Election Year!"

   "Attacks on Life: Efforts by this Congress to advance funding for and legality of human cloning and embryonic stem cell research undermine the value of human life and threaten to further divide our nation."

   "Saving the Pledge of Allegiance"

   "Supporting Prayer in School"

   "Protecting Marriage and Family" (Gay marriage, I assume...)

   Yikes..!

  Did her termination by the library violate any laws..?

Having read you PM on this, you may have a point, but so far it just looks like the library was trying to dodge a lawsuit, never mind that with such a gross violation of the law, the pervert would have no case.

Your Pal,
Doc
8)

Having read you PM on this, you may have a point, but so far it just looks like the library was trying to dodge a lawsuit, never mind that with such a gross violation of the law, the pervert would have no case.

Your Pal,
Doc
8)


  Don't think I'm trying to defend anyone even touching child porn.  The exploitation makes me want to spit.  The perv isn't the issue, here...

  It's not easy for an employee to sue an employer for being fired.  You can generally be fired for any reason at all, with limited exceptions for things like race and sex and disability.  Public employees like Biesterfeld, and union employees, sometimes have it easier.  But the best argument Biesterfeld has is that she was fired for being a "whistleblower," except she didn't blow the whistle on her employer, and she may have a tough time proving that the reason she was fired is because she reported the child pornography, and not because of some other reason that the library has not yet chosen to reveal to the press...

 

Having read you PM on this, you may have a point, but so far it just looks like the library was trying to dodge a lawsuit, never mind that with such a gross violation of the law, the pervert would have no case.

Your Pal,
Doc
8)


Without knowing ALL the facts...why-she was being fired...If it was for INVADING his privacy..I believe he was at a 'PUBLIC' Library..so whatever one chooses to do in a publicly domained area, can be dealt with by anyone ..so if she can say..that aside from being an employee..as a 'public' citizen, she is reporting it..hopefully it will stand.

Just like if you would walk past a person on the street while they were using a 'public phone' and heard them say 'you kill Johnny (?) and let me know you did it and you'll get your money' and you report this guy...it should stick as well.

Hope the lawyers hang in there to get this straightened in her favor.  Ledt us know more when you find it.

   Who the heck are these people, Doc?  Before I sign any petition, I'll attempt to gather more information from different sources...

   
   From LibertyAction.org:

   "Expose and defeat the ACLU"

   "Petition to Radio Disney: Don’t Ban God From Ads"

   "Help Empower Pastors To Speak Out During This Election Year!"

   "Attacks on Life: Efforts by this Congress to advance funding for and legality of human cloning and embryonic stem cell research undermine the value of human life and threaten to further divide our nation."

   "Saving the Pledge of Allegiance"

   "Supporting Prayer in School"

   "Protecting Marriage and Family" (Gay marriage, I assume...)

   Yikes..!

   Did her termination by the library violate any laws..?



If I'm librarian on duty and I see child porn on a monitor, I'm callin' the frikkin' pigs, man! I mean, that's gotta go!  However, I agree with Davster entirely in this post and his succeeding post.
Karma +1 for opinion well said.

BTW "Who the heck are thse people?" is exactly what I said when I saw who was behind Tipper Gore's PMRC!  She's the wife of liberal Democratic Senator Al Gore and her organization was all wrapped up with Coors, Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum, and a bunch of other religious right crazies!
:D

Both parties suck, and while I sympathize with the spirit of this thread, I'm not going to touch any petition offered up by a religious nutjob site.

One thing to bear in mind, however, is that child porn laws can sometimes cause very stupid things to happen.  There have been a number of teens who have literally been arrested for taking nude pics of themselves and distributing them over the net.  Some are even serving time in juvy right now.

We need to be vigilant in arresting adult child porn perverts, but we also need to protect teens that do foolish things without any criminal intentions.

the whole kiddie porn witchhunt is totally out of hand in this country. if this person is really guilty of surfing for kiddie porn at the library then by all means sign the petition, do whatever, but i have my doubts. i mean, CAN you even find kiddie porn on the internet at a public library? i thought those cats had their own little secret groups where they traded the stuff in private, out of the public eye. the highly illegal nature of it is such that you can't just google "kiddie porn" and be downloading it off the first hit you come up with.

but the whole frenzy about kiddie porn is such that people use it all the time to beat up on other folks they don't like. that could be what's going on here.

If in fact this story is true, then the library managers are in for a huge lawsuit that they cannot win.

the whole kiddie porn witchhunt is totally out of hand in this country. if this person is really guilty of surfing for kiddie porn at the library then by all means sign the petition, do whatever, but i have my doubts. i mean, CAN you even find kiddie porn on the internet at a public library? i thought those cats had their own little secret groups where they traded the stuff in private, out of the public eye. the highly illegal nature of it is such that you can't just google "kiddie porn" and be downloading it off the first hit you come up with.

but the whole frenzy about kiddie porn is such that people use it all the time to beat up on other folks they don't like. that could be what's going on here.


He got around the filter by going through his email or something like that.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-library26mar26,1,3211325.story

"By Biesterfeld's account, the uproar started Feb. 28, when she saw Chrisler staring at photos of naked, blond boys."

"On March 4, she called police when she saw Chrisler allegedly viewing the same kind of images. Police arrested him and confiscated the computer as evidence."

Okay, not a good start for Chrisler... but there is too much vagueness in the descriptions to know if he was indeed looking at child porn. Images of boys in Calvin Klein ads have been described by some as "child porn". There are legitimate reasons for viewing pictures of naked minors, though I doubt this particular individual was doing, say, medical research on developing male anatomy. . .

The Supreme Court has ruled that in order to be considered child porn, the material must contain a child in it. Reverse aging an adult to look underage via visual editing tools , as creepy as that is, is not illegal, and neither is viewing the results of such editing.

But, as Davester wrote, that isn't the issue. That the library has not released a definitive explanation of why this women (one with a good review just six weeks ago) was fired is pretty suspect in my book. Right now, it looks like they fired her because she got police involved in a matter that they thought should have been handled internally, all hush-hush.

Although Good Samaritan laws don't cover cases like this, I think they should... that is, reporting in good faith what you think is a crime whether or not it actually is. If you hear blood curdling screams from a house, you might assume something bad is going on. You call the cops. Turns out it's a mom and pop shooting their own no budget horror film. Oops...

From what I've heard, Good Samaritan laws in CA carry little weight anyway. Aside from being fired, Biesterfield might even face a lawsuit from this guy for invading his privacy or some other malarky.

How much privacy is to be reasonably expected in a public place? What were the library's policies on reporting things of this nature?

I wouldn't want to work for any place or anyone that would fire me for making a call like she did, if in fact that's how it played out. I'm not even sure why there is a petition to reinstate her at that library - I know I'd never work at that one again if I were her.

We've got a few librarians on this board - what say you?

Ant

  I take it that Biesterfield was a probationary employee.  This business with the favorable job review, six weeks earlier, could hurt the library.  Of course, nobody's produced the rating and, suppose she did become some sort of a malingerer or malcontent within the past six weeks..?

  I would assume like so many other probationary employees, you can be terminated without any particular cause at any time during your probation.  Too bad for the county that this incident had to happen right before they were able to terminate her for her lack of performance.  Unless, she's being quite truthful and her supervisor got her nose out of joint because Biesterfeld failed to follow her orders.  Either way, alarm bells should have sounded at the library that this might not be the right time to fire Biesterfeld and hope this would all go away...

Here's an interesting situation for you.  There was a guy in Lancaster who was nailed for 36 counts of child pornography.  Come to find out, it was computer generated images.  The defense attorneys argue "no victim, no crime".  In other words no child was harmed for the production of the images.  I'm not defending kiddie porn, but it is now being computer generated.  If you argue the point of well he was looking at the crap in a public place WHERE CHILDREN ARE KNOWN TO BE.  Then you have a strong case.  However to argue something else could be the verge of "thought police".

Brenda Biesterfeld needs your help.

Brenda did something I hope all of us would have the courage to do...

She blew the whistle on a man at her local library who was viewing child porn on the public library computers. The police caught him in the act and arrested him. The authorities then searched his home and found more child pornography.

Two days after she reported the man, Brenda was fired! In fact, within hours of when she reported the man to the police, she
was reprimanded by her boss for invading his "privacy." And then, without warning, she was fired.

I am asking you to sign a Petition calling for Brenda’s immediate reinstatement -- along with a formal apology from Lindsay, California library officials. Go here:

http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894
http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894

Liberty Counsel has taken up Brenda's case and we have already sent a Demand Letter to Lindsay library officials. But now I need your help to show those officials and the national media that we will not tolerate this outrageous firing -- and we will not sit by quietly when local officials take the side of child pornographers!

Please sign the petition today. More information is posted on the petition site. The more you learn about this case, the more outraged you will be. It took great courage for Brenda to take such a strong stand against child porn in her library. We need more citizens like Brenda!
That's why we cannot allow this library to get away with persecuting her. Thank you for standing with Brenda:

<a href="http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894">
http://www.libertyaction.org/r.asp?u=5634&PID=16012894

Your Pal,
Doc
8)


No, I'm not going to sign it.  Anything from Liberty.org reeks of Dobsonism/Focus On The Familyism.  If it was a legal foundation with no real political or religious affiliation I would sign it.

No, I'm not going to sign it.  Anything from Liberty.org reeks of Dobsonism/Focus On The Familyism.  If it was a legal foundation with no real political or religious affiliation I would sign it.
well they need your money too! it's not easy keeping america safe from the scourge of science and knowledge, you know.

well they need your money too! it's not easy keeping america safe from the scourge of science and knowledge, you know.


I'm not giving up my Doritos and Mountain Dew money for people who are against Gay Marriage because "God probably thinks it yucky" and believe that Mighty Mouse is snorting coke in his early cartoons.