MD librarian gives away the store

Precedent has been set. The Fibbies will no longer need a warrant in Frederick MD in order to take library computers.

The library’s procedure for such requests usually requires a court order, however after the agent described the case and the situation, he was persuaded to give them access, Batson [director of Frederick County Public Libraries] said.

“They had an awful lot of information,” he said, but he was not allowed to discuss specifics.

“It was a decision I made on my experience and the information given to me,” he said.

He broke library procedure in a major matter of patron privacy. I have a pretty good idea of how many minutes I would have my job, were I to do the same. If they had “an awful lot of information”, they had enough information to persuade a judge to sign a warrant (not that it generally takes much, these days). He also disposed of city property improperly, and he broke state law.

Doubtless Taranto will be saying that it was necessary to save some small girl from anthrax.

Via Jessamyn West, who notes: “I don’t see anything in the library’s policies that would prevent this from happening” and then links to the library’s public/patron policy page, when this is clearly a matter of personnel policy.