VA- The vindication of Ting-Yi Oei, an assistant principal at Freedom High School, in South Riding, Va.,

This is a followup of an earlier report: "My Students. My Cellphone. My Ordeal."

4-28-2009 Virginia:

NPR Story: Please listen to this..

When Ting-Yi Oei, an assistant principal at Freedom High School, in South Riding, Va., tried to investigate a sexting incident at his school, he never imagined that ultimately, he would be arrested and charged with possession of child pornography. The charges were tossed out by a judge earlier this month. Ting-Yi Oei talks about his case, and how it raises a number of issues, including questions of how the law is being used to go after sexting offenses.

Official Statement: Office of the Commonwealth's Attorney

Across the country we're seeing an outbreak of this "sexting" issue. Loudoun County is not immune from this. The question is what do we do about it. I believe that the parents need to be involved in the solution. I also expect that parents expect to be informed when the schools obtain information that their student is involved in this type of behavior.

When a school official finds out about it, what should they do: open discussion, counsel them, discipline them, notify their parents....these are all options, but none were done here.

In this case, the Assistant Principal, charged with discipline of the students, found out about it and didn't inform the parents of any of the children involved. In fact, he specifically told one student not to tell his parents.

Although he claims that he didn't know the identity of the young lady in the image, the evidence strongly contradicts this. At the end of the day, the sum total of his action toward helping these children was to do nothing, exempt keep a copy of the image on his personal cell phone for weeks, even after his supervisor told him to destroy it. That's irresponsible. It also raises specific questions as to why he retained the photo for such a long time.

-Jim Plowman, Office of the Commonwealth's Attorney, Loudon County, Va.

..News Source.. Also important are the reader's comments at the site, a few below:

A) District Attorneys are notorious for outrageous, ill conceived misuses of their power. There has to be a better way of selecting district attorneys and then monitoring and regulating their activities. See also US attorneys office for abuse/misuse of power to persecute/harrass.

B) I listened to the program...carefully, and read the statement by the Prosecutor, which was absolute nonsense. It sounds like another prosecutor jumping the gun trying to make a name for him or herself. I think disbarring him isn't really too harsh. Look at what he almost did to an innocent individual. One less attorney is a good thing. Texting is bad enough, putting pictures of yourself on a phone, in this preditory environment is dangerous. Teens aren't done being "cooked" yet. They need education. They need guidance. Discipline for this kind of stuff is the wrong approach. We...don't need any more "shoot from the hip" attornies. Thanks for the great programming.

C) The plight of Ting-Yi Oei and his family is the gravest tragedy of this sad ordeal. But also infuriating is the wholly irresponsible use of country resources by Mr. Plowman's office. Loudon residents should take the next opportunity to replace Mr. Plowman with a prosecutor committed to enforcing the law, not pursuing high-profile but illegitimate cases for personal gain.

D) As a representative of the Loudoun Education Association, I note that we proudly stand behind Mr. Oei. He did everything he should have done in his role as Assistant Principal. We are pleased that the judicial system summarily dismissed the unsupportable charges against him. The ongoing comments from the Commonwealth's Attorney are nothing more than an attempt to justify the improper charges he brought against Mr. Oei.