Porn Found on Coroner’s Computer Prompts Inquiry

Armstrong County Coroner Robert Bower said the public humiliation is a political move to discredit him by the commissioners.

by David Croyle

A Pittsburgh attorney announced no criminal charges will be filed against Armstrong County Coroner Robert Bower after pornography was discovered on county-owned computers that were in Bower’s possession.

In April 2009, Bower brought a laptop computer that was assigned for his use as Coroner to the county’s Information Technology (IT) department complaining of technical problems with the unit. Upon examination, the IT technicians discovered pornographic material stored on the hard drive.

According to Weiss, the commissioners hired him in June 2009 to advise them as to an appropriate course of action. “The purpose of the Commissioners retaining outside counsel was to ensure independent advice free of relationships in County government,” Weiss read from a prepared statement at a surprise address during the commissioner’s public meeting yesterday.  Weiss said that he advised the IT technicians to also seize the hard drive from Bower’s office desktop computer for examination.

“The results of the analysis revealed a shocking and disturbing pattern of violations of the County Internet Usage Policy by the Coroner on county-owned machines, as well as a serious breach of acceptable standards of behavior we expect,” Weiss’ report stated. “The analysis revealed numerous files on the desktop hard drive which were pornographic in nature and totally unrelated to professional activities.”

The Armstrong County commissioners sit fixed during yesterday’s public meeting as Attorney Ira Weiss delivers the tale of pornographic material found on the county-owned computers used by Coroner Robert Bower.

Weiss said the hard drives were sent to Reclamere, a forensic technology company located in Tyrone, to be analyzed.  Between December 10, 2003 and June 22, 2009, the pornographic material on Bower’s desktop computer was said to be accessed “literally hundreds of times.”

“The laptop shows a similar pattern. There were five videos which are adult and pornographic in nature and were accessed many times during April 9 and April 13, 2009. There were numerous picture items on the laptop hard drive dating from November 10, 2008 through April 13, 2009 with many being viewed multiple times on the same day,” Weiss wrote in his report.

When Weiss was asked by reporters to describe the material contained on the computers, he said there were thousands of images and portrayed them as pornographic in nature.

“I characterize it as everything from frat house material to hard core porn,” Weiss said.

Weiss said that he referred the matter to the Office of the Attorney General of Pennsylvania for review, “which has concluded that there were no violations of the criminal statutes of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.”

“The Coroner is independent elected official answerable to voters of Armstrong County,” Weiss said. “He does not work for commissioners. In reality, this is limited as to what can be done. With an independent official, it is hard to deal with that way.”

According to Weiss, the county’s IT department has restricted Internet sites that Bower can now access.

“The commissioners cannot reasonably withhold [computer usage] from him to function in his official role. He has to have access to computers. He needs computer access for his work. While the IT folks can address this better than I can, they have done what they can do to restrict sites that can be visited.”

Weiss said during his comments at the public meeting that Bower was aware of the results of investigation.  “We have had no response from him.  I think he has had ample opportunity to respond and he may have an answer following today. He has raised concerns that he did not have exclusive access. But this was not isolated event. The laptop was in his possession.  The hard drive was dated from 2003.”

Weiss said that Bower’s conduct placed the county’s technology system at great risk. “Viruses enter through these types of sites. Also, these sites are used by scam artists.”

County Commissioners Patricia Kirkpatrick, Rich Fink, and James Scahill sat solemnly as Weiss gave his report. When reporters asked them for comment, they offered no response and referred all questions to Weiss.

“I believe the commissioners have exercised due diligence in this matter,” Weiss said, speaking on their behalf. “The commissioners are hopeful this type of conduct does not happen by any employees, staff, or elected official.”

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  By Scoop, February 5, 2010 @ 11:29 AM

  I guess that is one way to ensure the three commissioners still have a job next time they are up for re-election….smear the person who indicated he might run against them.
  No criminal charges were filed, therefore nothing should have been said publicly, period.
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  By elderman, February 5, 2010 @ 5:27 PM

  I read this article and the following article with Mr. Bower’s retort that the commisshoner’s actions were politically driven. I do not know Mr. Bower, but before attempting to destroy his reputation I think he shold have been notified that this topic was on the meeting agenda and thus given the opportunity to publically defend himself. I’m sure the commissioners are aware of the social stigma associated with “pornography.” If what I read is true, there was no guarantee that the laptop and desktop computers were solely used by Mr. Bower, they were neither locked down or even password protected. If the commissioners have more information, they need to bring it forth in order to allay any suspicion that their actions were politically motivated.
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  By diggdugg88, February 5, 2010 @ 7:27 PM

  This whole situation is outrageous; while one may ask is this a smear campaign. I question the wherewithal of our commissioners to actually pull off a “smear campaign.” The three of them: a drunk, a do-nothing and a bully (you figure out which one is which) have a hard time just pulling off what they do best, which is look dumb and act stupid.
  Regardless of the fact that this may or may not be a smear campaign the questions I pose are these: How can there be little to no security at all on a laptop used for official county business? How can a county issued laptop have no password at all? Why would non-authorized users be accessing the hardware in the first place? Why is the laptop not encrypted? I’m guessing that there is a lot of taxpayer’s personal/confidential material stored and entered on that laptop- does anyone know if it’s secure or compromised right now???
  With viruses/Trojans/worms likely infecting the unit, taxpayer’s information could have been easily lost or stolen. Its not hard to imagine that with hundreds of porn photos on a laptop the user would have visited a lot of sites, and as an IT pro myself I know that online porn sites are the #1 means to acquire viruses and worms. The world we live in now is one full of identity theft and online fraud and a lot of this stems from visiting pornographic sites.
  As a taxpayer I want answers as to why the coroner was using what should be a secure device for personal business and also why the Armstrong County IT dept does not take security seriously. While you can’t completely control what a user does a minimum of common sense should have been applied when designing an IT security policy. How many other computers are being used by county staff right now with lax security?\
  That being said I suppose one can’t be too upset- usually employees are only as good as their leadership and in this case the leadership is our illustrious commissioners…

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