Bizarro case from Connecticut. A substitute teacher, Julie Amero, has been convicted of four counts of “risking injury to a child” for a popup atttack on the classroom PC that had X-rated images streaming across the monitor. Despite plentiful evidence (some of it blocked on a technicality) that the machine was infected, that the district had minimal (and outdated) safeguards against such things, and the sub asked for help but got none, she’s potentially facing 40 years in prison.
Unbelievable. These two articles have all the gory, outrageous details.
Now, having said that (and trusting that there will be appeals of the conviction, regardless), and acknowledging that the school district (and its IT group) were incompetent and the prosecutor’s office vindictive and insane …
I just don’t completely buy Amero’s story.
- She didn’t know how to turn off a computer? Or even a monitor? She knows how to e-mail her husband, or close a window, but not those things? I don’t believe it. I do believe that she had had drilled into her by permanent teachers to never touch their computers without instructions, and that she’d been told not to logoff the system that was in the class. But her level of incompetence, as described, is a bit beyond belief.
- I will accept that she didn’t have a jacket to throw over the monitor, but, really — over the course of a minute or two, if not the hours that seem to be involved, she couldn’t have found anything other than (unsuccessfully) her body to block the monitor? A book? A piece of paper? A student’s sweater or backpack? She couldn’t turn around the monitor, or even turn it face down? Give me a break.
None of this warrants a conviction. I don’t believe she acted in an improper fashion to have those popups start streaming across her system. But some of the excuses actually given strain my credulity, and probably didn’t help her credibility before the jury that convicted her.
Having worked in the tech support field for over 10 years now Dave, I can say with a fact that there are people out there who can send email but have no idea how to turn on or off a computer or a monitor.
I have people regularly ask me to help them get a file off a co-worker’s machine. Their computer is obviously there, they have a keyboard, and a mouse, and a monitor — but the user has a laptop that is with them, off-site. So, NO, I can’t get a file off their computer. And they still don’t believe me.
I also had someone who is technologically savvy ask me this past week why he couldn’t turn on a co-worker’s computer. All he kept getting was a dark screen. Turns out, the people had turned the monitor off so no matter how often he turned on/off the computer, no, it’s not going to show you anything but a blank screen until you turn on the monitor.
I will grant you that she should have covered the screen in some way. It may not have been possible to actually turn it…depending on the setup of the computer, there may have been no way to do so. Also, I’d bet she was quite flustered and couldn’t think of anything to do. Sounds like she’s not someone I’d want teaching my kids anyway!
I can see not asking her back because she didn’t handle a crisis well (what would have happened if it had been a *real* emergency, like a kid choking?). But that’d different from prosecution and possible prison time.
I’m also aware that there are folks with wildly varying levels of computer expertise — I’ve had years of tech support experience, even to this day (cough). I guess when I think of a monitor, I think of a glowing green on-off button on it. Though taking a swing through my office after that last sentence, I see that time and design have made that a lot less obvious (our mix of Compaq and IBM monitors have, at best, the little 1/0 “universal power icon” thang, which means that people the world-over can be confused).
I was about to say, but Julia said. Really. I can totally believe the woman’s story.
She might do just fine in a fire or other crisis. There is something about computer technology, that paralyzes the minds of certain otherwise intelligent and creative people. Knowing this I am careful never to blame the user, I don’t want to leave their offices with them feeling like dummies, because they aren’t. And if they were really computer savvy, I’d be out of a job.
My best guess in the case of this substitute teacher is she didn’t understand that the annoying popups would cause her to become an enemy of the state. This is a perfect example of Lyndon Johnson’s maxim; you should spend more time thinking about how a law will be misused than about how you intend for it to be used.
One of the best, truest things LBJ ever said.
The end of the story: http://www.reason.com/blog/show/130227.html
Executive summary – felony charges dropped in return for a guilty misdemeanor plea, a fine, and loss of teaching license. Oh, and, of course, legal fees incurred to defend against an asinine prosecution.
If there is any form of internet justice the DA’s computer will get infected.
BoingBoing Gadgets weighs in with some even more damning technical analysis about how the school district and prosecutors so are going to hell for ruining this woman’s life. http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2008/11/26/innocent-teacher-for.html