Stacie Halas, California Teacher Fired For Porn Star Past,
Loses Appeal
The Huffington Post
AP
OXNARD, Calif. -- A middle-school science teacher fired
after students learned she had appeared in pornographic movies had hoped not
just to get her job back, but to set a precedent for people looking to escape
an embarrassing personal history.
A three-judge commission put a decisive stop to both, saying
firmly and unanimously that Stacie Halas should not be in the classroom.
"We were hoping we could show you could overcome your
past," Halas lawyer Richard Schwab said Tuesday. "I think she's
representative of a lot of people who may have a past that may not involve anything
illegal or anything that hurts anybody."
Judge Julie Cabos-Owen said such a past matters in an age
when technology makes porn easy to access and hard to bury.
"Although her pornography career has concluded, the
ongoing availability of her pornographic materials on the Internet will
continue to impede her from being an effective teacher and respected
colleague," Cabos-Owen said in the 46-page decision issued Friday by the
Commission on Professional Competence.
Halas, 32, was continually deceitful about her nine-month
career in porn before she went to work at the school, the judges said.
Schwab said Halas "was being honest and forthright, but
was embarrassed and humiliated by her past experience in the adult
industry."
Halas was fired in April from her job as a science teacher
at Haydock Intermediate School in Oxnard after online videos of her in porn
were discovered by students and teachers.
Student claims that the teacher was moonlighting as a porn
star were initially dismissed after school officials said they couldn't find
any images of her on the Internet – but they were using the school's computers,
which don't allow access to porn.
Teachers then showed administrators downloads of Halas' sex
videos from their smartphones.
In hearings, former assistant principal Wayne Saddler
testified that at the start of a sex video, Halas talked about being a teacher
and he felt her effectiveness in the classroom had been compromised.
After rumors of her performance surfaced, profanity was
etched on Halas' classroom window, a teacher testified.
Schwab has said Halas did not star in pornographic movies
while teaching in any district. He said she took parts only during an
eight-month period from 2005 to 2006 because of financial problems after her
boyfriend abandoned her.
District superintendent Jeff Chancer applauded the
commission's ruling.
Halas' decision to "engage in pornography was
incompatible with her responsibilities as a role model for students,"
Chancer said in a statement.
Well, heck. I hope more people free to comment on my stories, rather than send me personal email comments. It's always better to be open and debate these things in public. I especially want to be open, and get my facts straight. There are some out there who are very much against bloggers because unlike real reporters, they do not do the things any credible reporter must do - fact check, source, get both sides of the story, etc.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I wanted to comment on this story. What a shame, and shame on this country, to not allow a poor woman to turn her life around after acting in porn, to then become a good teacher. She must wear a scarlet letter for the rest of her life. That was in her past. Heck, it's been pointed out she didn't even engage in anything illegal. But it was embarrassing.
She did claim she was forced to during dire financial circumstances. I think that is the major crime here. We all know how difficult life is these days, we can all mostly understand being out of work, and desperate to find work.
But why destroy someone's attempt to go forward in life based on something that happened in the past.
Cruel indeed!