Maine Library's It's Perfectly Normal Not Obscene, Police Agree
Jennifer Pinkowski -- Library Journal, 12/7/2007
A Maine library has been cleared of obscenity charges for having a controversial sex ed title on its shelves, and the patron who removed the book from the library will stand trial for theft. A police investigation found that the Lewiston Public Library (LPL) did not violate the town ordinance against obscenity by stocking It's Perfectly Normal, a children's guide to sexual health that is one of the most challenged titles in libraries and schools nationwide.Last summer, patron JoAn Karkos removed It's Perfectly Normal from LPL shelves and refused to return it, citing its "amoral abnormal contents." (Karkos also took the book from the public library in neighboring Auburn.) She sent a check to the library to cover the cost of the book, but the library returned it and had her charged with theft. Karkos responded by claiming the book failed Lewiston community standards, which prohibit obscene materials.
The police didn't agree. "According to the detective who investigated the complaint, one of the factors that led them to their decision was the fact that copies of the book have circulated 30 times since we added the title in 1995 and that hers has been the only complaint raised to date," library director Rick Speer told Library Journal. Indeed, continuing coverage in the Sun Journal, a regional newspaper, has drawn hundreds of comments from readers, most of whom condemn Karkos for both theft from a taxpayer-supported institution and for attempting to impose her personal morality on others.
On December 19, Karkos faces an arraignment hearing in Maine's 8th District Court in Lewiston because she herself violated a city ordinance, one "that requires citizens to return borrowed materials after being given notice to do so," Speer said. "We expect her to plead 'not guilty.'" Because of the publicity spike, both the Lewiston and Auburn libraries have added additional copies of It's Perfectly Normal to their shelves.
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