Opps, did I do that!Texas Judge resigns after being caught

texting instructions to prosecutorsto help win convictions

Texas district Judge Elizabeth E. Coker is stepping downfrom the bench after being caught engaging in a massive per-version of justice. A whistleblower revealed that Corker wassending text messages to prosecutors with suggestions onquestions to ask in court in order to secure a conviction.

From Houston Chronicle:State District Judge Elizabeth E. Coker—who sits on thebench over Trinity, Polk and San Jacinto counties—has re-signed under fire in a texting controversy, according to a vol-untary agreement with the State Commission on JudicialConduct.It stems from complaints and media stories alleging thatCoker “had engaged in improper ex parte text communica-tions with Polk County Assistant District Attorney KayceeJones while Judge Coker presided” over a criminal trial in Au-gust of 2012.

Texas judge learns about Public & Permanent Man downloads child porn at Starbucks

Roller rink guard killed taking on gunmanWoman burned to death near school

Top 5 social media security issues for 2015Principal buys shoes for entire school

Principal loses job over spelling mistake1-in-4 British kids had nude pics leaked onlineNJ Substitute teacher; Kiddy porn distributerQuestioning of student in office goes wrong

Teacher fired for sex-for-grade jokeRaped student suses school district

District pays to settle rape on field tripBoard approves audio recording on buses

Links to security stories at schools

THIS WEEK

With those complaints, “the commission commenced an in-vestigation into allegations that Judge Coker used AssistantDistrict Attorney Jones to privately communicate information”about the case “to suggest questions for the prosecutor toask during the trial” among other issues.

The agreement alsosaid the commissionlooked into other com-plaints that Coker al-legedy engaged inother improper commu-nications and meetingswith Jones, other mem-bers of the Polk Countyprosecutor’s office, the

San Jacinto County District Attorney and certain defense at-torneys.The agreement goes on to say “the parties agree that the al-legations of judicial misconduct, if found to be true, could re-sult in disciplinary action against Judge Coker.” As a result,the parties sought to resolve the matter “without the time andexpense of further disciplinary proceedings.”Coker did not admit any guilt or fault.Honestly, I feel that Coker is getting off far too lightly. Her ac-tions may have caused innocent people to end up in prison.She should be face criminal charges for such a grave viola-tion of the law. Her resignation also opens the door for a flurry of re-trials foranybody convicted in her court sessions. By trying to illegallysecure convictions, Coker opened Pandora’s box, and nowthe state of Texas will have some massive legal knots to un-tangle. UPDATE: via the research of Poor Richard’s Reader Bob,let’s play guess the political party affiliation of this corruptjudge! Ready to play? Yep. You guessed it. She’s a Democrat….UPDATE #2: Several of our liberal Democrat friends havepointed out that Ms. Coker “switched parties” shortly beforegetting caught breaking the law. Not only is that all too con-venient, but it’s irrelevant. That makes her about as crediblea “Republican” as Florida’s Charlie Crist. Besides that, she

was elected as a Democrat not on the GOP ticket, so any at-tempts to turn this back around and blame it on Republicansor “Republican values” (as some have tried to say) is laugh-able and delusional.

Man downloads child porn at StarbucksHILLSBORO, Ore. — Detec-tives on Saturday arrested aregistered sex offender while hewas allegedly downloading childpornography at a Hillsboro Star-bucks, the Washington CountySheriff's Office said.The lead detective in the casearrested Robert Dietz, 59, forsimilar crimes in 2009, accord-ing to Sgt. Vance Stimler.Detectives arrested Dietz at the Starbucks located at 1st Av-enue and Main Street while he allegedly tried to downloadchild porn using free Wi-Fi, Stimler said.Dietz was jailed on two counts of encouraging child sexabuse.Detectives began surveillance at the Starbucks location andidentified Dietz as the suspect after receiving several leadsin the case, Stimler said.

Witness: Roller rink guard killed taking on gunman

GRAND TERRACE, Calif. - A security guard died confrontinga gunman firing at a crowd outside a Southern Californiaroller rink where about 200 people, including many children,gathered for an all-night New Year's Eve party, authoritiesand witnesses said Friday.

"He saved a bunch of kids andfamilies, no doubt in my mind,"said Michael Marcoly, a driverwho was sitting in his big-rig inthe parking lot when the gun-fire broke out at Cal Skate inthe city of Grand Terrace, be-tween Riverside and SanBernardino.The guard, RichardWilliamson, 48, of Riverside,was killed and two other men

were injured, the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Depart-ment said in a statement. Another security guard and a manwere expected to survive.A day after the shooting, detectives were asking for the pub-lic's help in seeking suspects, and no details on a motive hadbeen released.Marcoly told CBS Los Angeles he saw "muzzle flashes com-ing from both sides of the parking lot.""I saw people scattering. It's really hard for me to say, but Isaw the security officer go down, and he died a hero," hesaid.The other victims were a 28-year-old and a 22-year-old, thesheriff's statement said. One was treated at the scene, andthe other was hospitalized. Their names have not been re-leased.The skating rink said in a statement that it's working with au-thorities. Its website still had posted an advertisement for theevent, billed as "All-Night Skate NYE 2015 Glow Party.""Our prayers are with the officer and who was involved andthose who witnessed this tragic event," the statement said.

Williamson was the owner of Big Will's Security Services, thesecurity firm that provided the guards for the party, the River-side Press-Enterprise reported.

Woman burned, dies near Union Townshipschool hours into New Year; no foul play, authorities say

UNION — A woman who was found near a township schoolearly today suffered serious burns and died, authorities con-firmed.The woman, who was not identified, was found about 2:45a.m near the Hannah Caldwell Elementary School, 1120Commerce Avenue.No foul play is suspected, said Mark Spivey, spokesman forthe Union County Prosecutor’s Office. He said an autopsywill be conducted on Friday, and no other information is avail-able about the cause of death.Both township police and investigators from the UnionCounty Homicide Task Force went to the scene. It was un-clear whether the woman died before police arrived orpassed away a short time later.“It is not believed that foul play was involved,” Spivey said.Details of how the woman was first discovered were not im-mediately available. (NJ Star Ledger)

Top 5 Social Media SecurityPredictions of 2015

Mobile ransomware, targeted job fraud, and Trojans lurkingbehind shocking videos are all expected to make their ap-pearance on social media in 2015, security software solutionsprovider Bitdefender warns.Studies in the last year on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitterallowed Bitdefender security researchers to forecast futuretrends. While the trends seem mainly dangerous for individ-ual social media users, growing corporate adoption of BYODpolicies mean that they could also spell disaster for an entirecompany.

Here are the topfive social mediapredictions forthe coming year:Mobile ran-somware couldhit social net-worksThough theJune takedownof the Zeus bot-

net threw a wet blanket on Cryptolocker, variants of the e-threat found its way on new platforms. Users should remainskeptical of any message accusing them of various crimessuch as zoophilic behavior and distributing child pornography.All these may be part of ransomware campaigns and couldhit social networks as well.Trojans hiding behind horrid videos on a riseMalicious links hidden in atrocious Facebook videos will beon the rise in 2015, Bitdefender warns. A two-year study bythe antivirus software developer recently revealed suchvideos account for almost one per cent of all social mediascams. And malicious ‘beheading and murder’ videos are ex-pected to multiply in the following year. Behavior analysts andpsychologists say teenagers are the most susceptible toclicking on shocking videos, as their empathy for victims ofviolence is lower.Work-at-home scams to claim more victims

LinkedIn will be hit by a higher number of “work-at-home”scams luring job-seekers with promises of huge salaries foralmost no effort. With many positions moving in the virtualworld, such social engineering attacks will claim more victimsin 2015. Users are advised to watch out for poorly completedprofiles and dubious recruiters.Popular searches will make for popular scamsBitdefender also draws a warning sign on popular Googlesearches. Besides typical SEO poisoning, cyber-criminals willalso use social networks such as Twitter and Facebook tospread scams based on search interest.“Google’s recent list of top searches coincided with some ofthe most popular scams this year, indicating this trend is aliveand well,” Bitdefender Chief Security Strategist Catalin Cosoisaid. “While in 2013, people just wanted to know how totwerk, this year brought more interest in topics such as Ebola,Robin William’s death, the World Cup and Malaysian AirlinesFlight 370. Scammers used all these searches to target highnumbers of victims on Facebook, Twitter and via traditionale-mail spam.”Celebrity deaths tend to dominate Google’s year-end list aswell, and Bitdefender predictsscammers will continue to ex-ploit the names of any de-ceased celebrity.Malvertising on social networksMalvertising is on the rise, withalmost one in three ad net-works serving this repackagede-threat, according to Bitde-fender research. Facebook’s ad platform also hosts fraudu-lent and malicious ads from web categories that seem tocopy spam patterns. In 2015, users should be cautious ofmalvertising, as it will become more than simple click-fraud.Bitdefender advises users to keep in mind both old and newe-threats that might interfere with their social media experi-ence in 2015. Users should also keep their security solutionsupdated on all Internet-connected devices, avoid signing infrom unsecure hotspots and report all suspicious socialmedia activities.

Principal Raises Money To Buy Shoes For Entire School After Seeing Kids'

This educator proves some of the most important lessonsaren't academic.Nissa Ellet, principal of Heth-Washington Elementary in In-diana, became concerned for her students after noticing thatmany of them owned shoes that frequently needed mending,according to WDRB. So she did something about it."Throughout the year we have repaired -- I can't even tell youhow many shoes," Ellett told the WAVE3 News. "We've usedduct tape and staples and I started really noticing this is amuch bigger problem than I realized."Many students'families had fallenon hard times inthe past few years,and poverty hadrisen to about 75percent at theschool, accordingto WAVE3 News.So Ellett reachedout to the commu-nity through socialmedia for dona-tions to go towardnew tennis shoesfor the children,calling her pro-gram, "Shoes For Students." While her original goal was toraise $6,000, the community shattered her expectations."We ended up raising $17,000 so we expanded, we reeval-uated ... what else can we get for our students," the principaltold WDRB.Along with new tennis shoes, Ellet used the money to buysnow boots, gloves, hats, scarves, a school hoodie andcandy for every student, WHAS11 reported. And earlier thismonth, the excited children were brought to the gym for aspecial ceremony where they received their surprises. It wasan event that left many kids in the Christmas spirit."They are warmer than my other shoes were," one grateful

student told WAVE3 News of her new footgear.Another student, fourth-grader Donovin Allen, told the source,"As soon as it snows, I'm going to go out there and just wearthem."While the initiative gave the students a reason to smile thisholiday season, it also shined a spotlight on the community'swillingness to support their school."The response that they got shows how much this communitycomes together when the kids need them," Laura Schneider,a parent of a student, told WDRB.

Principal Loses Job Over Misspelled School Sign

When a New Jersey public school principal was reassignedlast week, the writing was on the wall.Actually, it was on the school sign -- which was misspelled atleast twice.Antoinette Young, the principal of Public School Number 20in Paterson, New Jersey, was demoted to a vice principal po-sition at another school after parents discovered a sign infront of the school's side entrance had two serious spellingerrors that went unnoticed for more than a week. (HuffingtonPost)

1 in 4 British Young People Had Naked Pho-tos Leaked Online

Some 24 per cent of young British adults had naked photosof them shared on the Internet without their consent, a newUK survey reveals.As a result, a third of respondents said they felt less confi-dent, 26 per cent had suicidal thoughts and 24 per cent tried

to harm them-selves.“An ex-boyfriendof mine tooknaked photos ofme on holidayand then decidedto send it toEVERYONE weknew via What-

sApp,” said Siobhan, 22 years old. “He then uploaded thepicture online and continued to send it. I got the police in-volved and they said there was nothing they could do aswhen someone has a photo of you ‘it becomes their propertyto do as they wish with it.”When it comes to sexting, 37 percent of respondents saidthey have sent a naked photo to their better halves, at leastonce, for “harmless fun” or to “receive photos back.” Thosewho didn’t send naked photos said they just don’t want to doit (73 per cent), with no further explanation.Investigating the causes of cyberbullying, the Wireless Re-port also shows teens frequently access image-sharing appson their smartphones. Some 65 per cent use Snapchat sev-eral times a day, 55 per cent access Instagram and 47 percent use WhatsApp multiple times per day.About 62 per cent admit receiving nasty private messageson social networks apps such as Grindr, Skype and Kik Mes-senger. But half of them have never reported it because theydidn’t think it was serious enough.The survey, ordered by anti-bullying charity Ditch the Label,was conducted on a sample of over 1,000 young people fromacross the United Kingdom, aged 13-25 yrs.

NJ Substitute teacher charged with distributing child porn

MANCHESTER – A mancharged in early Decemberwith distributing childpornography was subse-quently removed from hissubstitute teaching job inManchester Townshipschools, SuperintendentDavid Trethaway said.Modesto Torres, 65, of Man-chester was arrested on De-cember 2, 2014 at his EighthAvenue home following aninvestigation by the OceanCounty High Tech CrimeUnit and the Manchester Township Police Department. Au-thorities charged Torres with one count each of possessingand distributing child pornography.Torres was a substitute teacher who most recently worked inManchester Township High School, Trethaway said. SinceTorres' arrest, he has been removed from the district's list ofsubstitute teachers, the superintendent said.Prior to his arrest, Torres underwent a background check andfingerprinting to work in the district, and had a certificate tosubstitute teach, Trethaway said. During Torres' time workingat the schools, there were no complaints or concerns abouthis performance, the superintendent said.

Questioning in the office takes an unexpected turn

Does your state provide extra protections to kids accused ofjuvenile offenses?Because New Mexico does, and that made all the differencein a delinquency proceeding after a principal, with an SROpresent, questioned a student about breaking a school rule– and the questioning revealed he’d broken a law, too.

Principal knows her job

Assistant Principal Vanessa Sarna’s job is to enforce disci-pline at Kirtland Central High School.She says she often deals with student disciplinary cases “justone right after another.”Student seems drunkIn April 2010, teachers brought 17-year-old Antonio T. toSarna’s office. They thought he might be drunk. That couldmean a suspension.Sarna called in the SRO, Deputy Sheriff Emerson Charley,to administer a breath test. As Charley – in full uniform andwearing a side arm – prepared the breathalyzer, Sarna askedAntonio if he’d been drinking – and, if so, what, how muchand with whom.She told him he’d get a less severe suspension if he told herthe truth.Student admits to crimeAntonio admit-ted he dranktwo shots ofalcohol. Hebrought it toschool in asoft drink bot-tle that he putin the trashnear the li-brary.Possession ofalcohol by aminor is a delinquent act in New Mexico.Without first reading Antonio his Miranda rights, Charley toldAntonio to breathe into the breathalyzer. His breath testedpositive for alcohol.Charley left to look for the soft drink bottle. He didn’t find it.On his return, he read Antonio his rights – including his rightto remain silent.Antonio then refused to answer any other questions about

the alcohol – but Charley included his answers to Sarna’squestions in the police report.The state later charged Antonio with possession of alcoholby a minor.Law provides extra protectionAntonio asked the judge to suppress his confession becausehis rights were violated in eliciting it. The judge refused.On appeal, the appeals court affirmed – but the statesupreme court reversed.Under New Mexico law, a child aged 15 or older who’s sus-pected of a delinquent act can’t be questioned before he’sadvised of his rights and has knowingly, intelligently and vol-untarily waived them.Suppressing any statements made without such a waiver isthe remedy for violating this law.The lower courts refused to suppress Antonio’s statementsbecause they were responses to a principal’s questions.They believed the law only applies to police questioning.The supreme court clarified it doesn’t, but specified his state-ments can be used against him in school disciplinary pro-ceedings.The law applies only to criminal proceedings.State v. Antonio T., Nos. 33,997 & 33,999, 2014 WL 5377530(N.M. 10/23/14).

Popular teacher’s sex-for-a-better-grade jokecost him his job

An arbitrator lacked theauthority to reinstate ateacher fired for breach-ing an anti-harassmentpolicy.So Massachusetts’ highcourt vacated the rein-statement award.

Mark Zagaeski said he meant no offense; it was just part ofhis informal teaching style to engage his math and physicsclass for struggling students.In that class, “Mary” asked if she could pay for a better grade.A male student jokingly suggested sexual favors instead. Za-gaeski jokingly agreed and then said, “Don’t be ridiculous.”He said only better work would improve her grade – and of-fered to help Mary after school.Bystander is shockedLater, in front of a student not in the class, Mary again askedto pay for a better grade. Zagaeski said she knew he’d onlyaccept a sexual favor.The other student complained to a counselor – and triggeredan investigation.Zagaeski was dismissed for conduct unbecoming a teacher,but an arbitrator reversed his dismissal.On one hand, the arbitrator found Zagaeski violated the ha-rassment policy and created a hostile or offensive educa-tional environment for a student. But the arbitrator decided itwas a minor violation only nominally constituting unbecomingconduct.The school committee appealed Zagaeski’s reinstatement allthe way up to the state’s highest court.The high court reversed it.

Focus should have been on safetyMassachusetts law authorizes an arbitrator who’s reviewinga teacher’s dismissal to take into account the best interestsof students and the need to raise performance standards.The arbitrator said Zagaeski’s strong job performance meantreinstating him was in students’ best interests.But the high court put his dismissal back in place.It said when a teacher has jeopardized students’ safety orself-esteem, students’ best interests should be assessedmainly in terms of a safe learning environment – not in termsof raising their academic performance.School Committee of Lexington v. Zagaeski, 12 N.E.3d 384(Mass. 2014).

Raped student sues – says safety plan wasn’t followed

A suit claimed a special edstudent was raped becauseher school didn’t follow asafety plan.But a California appealscourt said the suit didn’tstate a valid negligenceclaim under state law.Only a law or a regulationwith the force of law can cre-ate the kind of duty the student alleged here.The safety plan in this case was intended to keep suspendedstudents from coming to school. It called for the school to no-tify the student’s folks, post the suspension to teachers’ at-tendance programs and email a daily list of suspendedstudents to school security guards.Went with ‘friend’ to parking lotR.G. was a special ed student in high school.She and James had the same algebra class. They talkedsometimes.

The school suspended James. Per the safety plan, staff triedto call his guardian but couldn’t reach her.James went to school despite his suspension. He went to hisPE class, carefully evading the teacher. He also ran into R.G.twice.The second time, R.G. went with him to the student parkinglot. James raped her there between two cars.R.G. sued, alleging the school district breached its duty to“create a safe and secure environment” by not following thesafety plan.But California decisions have held such safety policies don’tcreate that kind of legal duty – so the trial court was right todismiss R.G.’s suit.R.G. v. San Bernardino City Unified School Dist., No.G049924, 2014 WL 5320262 (Cal. Ct. App. 10/20/14).

Student raped on field trip: District pays bigSeattle Public Schools hasagreed to pay $700,000 tosettle the claims of a stu-dent who alleged she wasraped by a classmate dur-ing a field trip.The unidentified victim andalleged assailant weresophomores at GarfieldHigh School.Both students participatedin a three-day outdoor-edu-cation program at OlympicNational Park — a school-sponsored event. The girl said theclassmate raped her at the park.The incident was investigated by the FBI and the NationalPark Service, but no criminal charges were filed. The schoolalso conducted its own investigation.The girl’s parents filed a Title IX complaint with the U.S. De-partment of Education, claiming the district:

1. discriminated against their daughter2. failed to do a prompt and proper investigation, and3. failed to protect their daughter from retaliation after she re-ported the rape.District settlesAlthough the district admitted no liability in this incident, it out-lined several steps it plans to take in the future, such as pro-viding:1. increased supervision on overnight trips, including middle-of-the-night bed checks2. detailed training for chaperones on how to properly reportproblems.

School board approves audio recording on buses

In a 6-3 vote, the State College Area School Board of Direc-tors has approved using audio recording on school busesand other district vehicles.You might be wondering: But what about wiretapping laws?Last year the state of Pennsylvania amended its wiretappinglaw, giving school districts an exemption on the ban of audiorecordings.Video surveillance is already installed on the buses, but theaudio recording feature had been turned off to stay in com-pliance with state law. Now the audio capabilities will beturned back on.The district has specific plans on how it will use the audiorecordings, including:1. informing parents about the technology2. posting signs in the vehicles, clearly stating the recordingchange, and3. accessing the audio recordings only when an incident ona vehicle requires an investigation.

LINKS to security stories I didn’t feel pain: 14-year old girl says after shootinghttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2896530/I-didn-t-feel-pain-Girl-14-recalls-terrifying-moment-shot-Roswell-middle-school-gym-classmate-left-150-lead-pellets-body.htmlWoman wounded in shooting near schoolhttp://wwlp.com/2015/01/05/shooting-in-springfield/Armed school guards lack mental health screeninghttp://www.golocalpdx.com/news/Armed-School-Guards-Lack-Mental-Health-Screening14 year old boy shot & killedhttp://chicago.cbslocal.com/2015/01/03/boy-14-fatally-shot-in-rosemont/15 year old shot & killedhttp://www.wrex.com/story/27755194/2015/01/04/young-shooting-victim-mourned-at-vigil-schools-prepare-to-break-tragic-newsFriends recall Sunday school teacher killedhttp://www.tampabay.com/news/publicsafety/crime/friends-recall-tampa-bay-man-killed-in-shooting-wednesday-as-loving-father/2212268Three (3) indicted in Portland school shooting http://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/crime/arti-cle/3-indicted-in-Portland-school-shooting-enter-pleas-5988804.phpHamilton teen sentenced for shooting threathttp://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/mon-tana/hamilton-teen-sentenced-for-commencement-shooting-threat/article_c83c1f93-f962-57cf-8b11-f1ae74c979da.htmlUtah teen accused of school shooting plothttp://www.northwestgeorgianews.com/associated_press/news/national/utah-teen-accused-of-school-shooting-plot-charged/article_2447103e-906b-11e4-aa14-ef8b3ac4a561.html

Long Branch Long Branch Public Schools Public Schools

AdministrationAdministrationMichael Salvatore, Ph.D

SuperintendentAlvin L. Freeman

Assistant SuperintendentJanetLynn Dudick

District Administrator for PersonnelPeter E. Genovese III

School Business Administrator & Board SecretaryNancy L. Valenti

Assistant Business Administrator &Assistant Board Secretary

Roberta FreemanDistrict Administrator for Assessment &

Accountability

Board of EducationBoard of EducationJames N. Parnell - President

Mary L. George - Vice PresidentLucille M. PerezAvery W. Grant

Michele Critelli, Ed.D. Bill Dangler

Armand R. Zambrano, Jr.Donald C. CovinRose M. Widdis