Minneapolis Police Arrest Library Patron
on Child-Porn Charges
A patron at the Minneapolis Public Library’s Northeast Branch was arrested March 8 for allegedly viewing child pornography online, MPL Director Mary Lawson has confirmed to American Libraries. Police also removed the machine being used by the suspect, although Lawson anticipated early March 9 that it would be returned later that day.
A branch security guard on his rounds called police from his cell phone after catching an inadvertent glimpse from a book-stack aisle of what he believed to be child pornography on the screen. The guard remained standing in the same spot, which afforded him a view of the privacy-screened monitor, lest the man leave before police arrived. When they did, the machine was powered down and roped off to preserve evidence. There were no children in the vicinity, Lawson emphasized.
Before agreeing to relinquish the machine, Lawson conferred with the city attorney who cautioned authorities that the “level of intrusion” couldn’t invade the privacy of any other patrons whose Internet caches or e-mails might still reside on the seized machine. Last year, Jefferson Parish (La.) Library officials emphasized the same point to authorities who seized a branch computer during a similar event.
Characterizing the episode as a “singular incident,” Lawson stressed that libraries are still “safe and good places for kids.”
Posted March 12, 2001.
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