County Homeland Security Officers Drop In on Library, Order Patrons Not To View Porn
Until two security guards stood in the center of the Little Falls Library and told patrons to stop viewing online porn sites, the county Department of Homeland Security had kept a quiet watch over county-owned buildings.
In an incident reported Friday by The Washington Post, two county Homeland Security guards entered the Little Falls Library in Bethesda on a routine patrol on Feb. 8. When one of the guards saw a library patron at a computer with pornography on the screen, he made a public announcement that such sites were forbidden….
‘‘When reminded by library staff that Montgomery County Public Library policy supports the rights of patrons to view the materials of their choice, the veteran officer continued to press his case — making the situation worse,” [Chief Administrative Officer Bruce F.] Romer said.
County Executive Douglas M. Duncan (D) called the guards’ actions ‘‘highly inappropriate, unauthorized and in violation of county policy,” he said in a statement. ‘‘What they did was wrong and I do not condone, in any way, shape or form, their behavior.”
They never should have given them baseball caps with “Homeland Security” on them. That would make anyone want to go out and make up some new laws.
Related Link: Original Washington Post article from 02/17/2006. [Requires log-in]
It isn’t right that people walking by with their kids to do research for school should have to see that kind of stuff in a library. That’s worse than driving down the road with a porn video on that anyone passing you can see.
I hate to say it but, it is illegal to look at porn in a public place.
Maybe the library should invest in private cubicles or something. People could use a coin operated timer to activate it.
Does anyone remember the story of they man who got arrested for watching porn on his car’s DVD player whille driving?
Good to see Homeland Security putting its people to work against the real threats to national security!
Shades of the geheimstadt politza – which during WWII was abbreviated to Gestapo.
Geeese, Now I really feel Safe. Thank you Home Land Security!
So far I havent seen anything positive come out of Homeland Security.
Thier have been reports of items stolen from passengers luggage, drug trafficing by HS marshalls, sale of our ports to dubai, and now this. And how much has this added protection cost us?
We need security equipment to protect us not a bunch of Federal Security gaurds.
The Time has come for a big company to print up baseball caps with “Homeland Security” on them and pass them out at every library in America.
Some librarys restrict the websites you can visit on thier dime. I agree We must protect our children from adult content. The library should make the work stations a little more private
On the other hand,
Porn should be viewed in the privacy of a persons home or starbuck,
Some how a homless guy watching porn in the public library just gives me an unwanted creepy chill.
Dumb cops wait thats redundent.It always suprises me how obsessed with sex anti porno groups are.Maybe they should find a nice quiet place and jack off by themselves and leave us “normal”porn lovers alone.
>>It isn’t right that people walking by with their kids to do research for
>>school should have to see that kind of stuff in a library.
It isn’t right that people are selling fake NFL jerseys at the Super Bowl, either. But is this really a job for…..HOMELAND SECURITY?? Shouldn’t they be out identifying innocent American citizens for the gummint to illegally wiretap, or something?
we need to send these guys to the border with Mexico, they would be in Homeland Security heaven and the Library would be safe for porn lovers everywhere.
As a point of reference, Montgomery County employed Chief Charles Moose, the guy who caught the DC Area Snipers.
I suppose the agent should have addressed his concerns to the library staff. It is their responsibility to see that the computers are not abused.
Asshole had a power-trip is all. What kind of losers are they signing up for homeland security?
Wasn’t Moose just a showboater as I recall?
There is no legitimate reason to be viewing porn in the public library. If you want to view it — fine — save your money and buy a computer and get internet access at home. You are well within your legal rights to do so.
Just about every library that I have ever been in has had a posted policy against viewing porn. Now, there is some material that should be limited to adults that is not porn and in those cases the libraries either allow it or turn off any filtering that may be in place.
Should Homeland Security be doing this stuff — no — they’re idiots, though, so they probably don’t know any better.