Teacher resigns after nude picture shared
Student found photo on her cellphone
Columbia, S.C. — A high school teacher lost her job after a teenager went through her cellphone between classes, found a nude picture of her and shared it on social media.
No students have been disciplined, pending a police investigation.
Union County School District Superintendent David Eubanks, who forced Leigh Anne Arthur to resign or be fired, said Thursday that it’s her fault for leaving students unattended during a fourminute break between classes.
“She has tried to make this out as though it was strictly related to the photos,” Eubanks said. “I could care less what her pictures are on the cellphone.”
More than 8,000 people signed a petition by Thursday afternoon urging that the teacher get her job back. Nearly 3,000 commented as well, many expressing shock that the victim is being blamed.
Arthur, 33, told police on Feb. 18 that while she stepped out of her classroom, a 16year-old boy took her unlocked smartphone from her desk, opened the photos application and found a nude selfie she had taken for her husband as a Valentine’s present.
Then, using his own phone, the boy took a picture of the image and shared it. Soon, other students were sharing it on social media, and someone left copies, along with a harassing note, in Arthur’s mailbox.
State police have examined this evidence along with the student’s cellphone, State Law Enforcement Division spokesman Thom Berry said Thursday.
School officials are unsure how many people saw the image. None of the students involved have been suspended or expelled, although criminal charges are likely, Eubanks said Thursday.
“The students are probably going to be charged by law enforcement,” Eubanks said. “When you start transmitting pictures of nude people, on cellphones, it’s probably against the law.”
Arthur, a 13-year veteran, quit her job teaching mechanical and electrical engineering and computer programming at the school’s vocational center. She did not immediately return messages left Thursday by the Associated Press.
Arthur told local media that it’s part of her job to monitor the hallway between classes. But Eubanks said some students said she was in an adjoining room at the time, and that’s why she was told to resign or be fired for failing to supervise her class.
“We all make stupid decisions when we’re 16,” Arthur told WYFF-TV about the student. Still, “he had the ultimate decision to take pictures of my pictures and he had the ultimate decision to send them out.”