Disruption would likely result merely from parents and students knowing that Melzer is a (self-described) pedophile, regardless of whether Melzer is a member of NAMBLA or associates with NAMBLA members. Parents and students would not likely be persuaded by any school board report finding that Melzer was not dangerous. Thus it seems the school board's action may not have been based directly on Melzer's first amendment activities, but rather on the knowledge in the community that Melzer is a pedophile.
Mark S. Scarberry Pepperdine University School of Law
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Yes, that would have been a very different case. In fact, the Second Circuit opinion states that "Melzer is a self described pedophile and admits to being sexually attracted to young males up to the age of 16." If the school had fired him because of his sexual desires, presumably there would be no First Amendment issue here. But it didn't. There was no evidence that Melzer engaged in any illegal or inapproriate conduct at Bronx Science in his 31 years teaching there. Presumably for this reason, among others, a School Board Report appears to have concluded that Melzer was not a risk to sexually abuse his students. 196 F. Supp. 2d at 241. Thus, the district court concluded that "Melzer was terminated solely because his employer reasonably believed that the public exposure of his associational activities outside of the workplace as a member of NAMBLA was likely to impair Melzer's effectiveness as a teacher and cause internal disruption if he were returned to the classroom." Id. at 245. There does not appear to have been any dispute in the court of appeals that Melzer was fired because of his First Amendment activities, rather than because of his sexual desires.
Marty
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- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization as Grounds for... Scarberry, Mark
- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization as Ground... Marty Lederman
- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization as Ground... Scarberry, Mark
- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization as Gr... Marty Lederman
- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization a... Frank Cross
- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization as Ground... Gilbert, Lauren
- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization as Gr... Matthew J. Franck
- Re: Membership in Disfavored Organization as Ground... Scarberry, Mark