A Tulare County library worker says she was fired for telling police about a man she saw viewing child pornography on a Lindsay branch computer. Brenda Biesterfeld’s allegations are creating a dustup in Lindsay, where federal law-enforcement agents are joining the investigation following last week’s arrest of Donny Lynn Chrisler for suspicion of possessing child pornography.
Biesterfeld, who had worked for the county for nearly six months, said she called her supervisor and told her what happened. “She told me to write him a note saying this was a first warning, and if he gets a second warning he’d be banned from the library.”
“So then I said, ‘I need to contact the police, right?’ and she said no,” Biesterfeld said. “She said it’s more common than I’d think.”
Update:
The City of Lindsay is outraged:
In a blistering letter, the Lindsay City Council late today said a supervisor at the Tulare County Library told Lindsay police they had “no business” interfering with a child pornography incident because the library staff was handling it.
David, in addition to the above (and I have links to lots of news and blogs discussing this issues at http://del.icio.us/plan2succeed/LindsayCA ), I find it disturbing that the library supervisor accuses the fired librarian of not being “loyal” – now where in history has that occurred before:
“[My supervisor] said I worked for the county, and when the county tells you to do something, you do what the county tells you. She said I had no loyalty to the county. I told her I was a mother and a citizen also, and not just a county employee.”
“— Fired Lindsay librarian Brenda Biesterfeld, relating a conversation with her supervisor, Judi Hill.”
That’s from http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080314/NEWS01/803140331
That’s insane! What is this country coming to? We’ve traded freedom (which requires laws) for license (which requires no laws) and if this garbage keeps up, we’ll soon reap a terrible harvest.
[...] forwarded a copy of this letter from the City Council of Linday, California expressing outrage over the firing of a librarian for reporting child pornography. The full letter in PDF form is below the fold: March 12, [...]
I’m just shocked that the entire Tulare county(Supervisors)is basically sticking up for this supervisor too. County Supervisors had a meeting yesterday and basically concluded that her firings were unrelated. Basically the right for the allege man outweighs the right of children in a public setting. I thought childporn is illegal regardless at home or Public Library. Where’s dateline when we needed them!