California teacher Stacie Halas, a.k.a. Tiffany Six, fired after officials learn of porn career
I suspect at least a few adolescent boys at Haydock Intermediate School in Oxnard, Calif., are disappointed science teacher Stacie Halas won't be showing up to class anymore.
The attractive 32-year-old blond this week lost the appeal against her dismissal following revelations she'd moonlighted in pornographic videos to make ends meet.
A three-judge commission ruled unanimously that Halas should not be allowed back in a classroom after being fired last April, The Associated Press reported.
“We were hoping we could show you could overcome your past,” Halas' lawyer Richard Schwab said Tuesday. “I think she’s representative of a lot of people who may have a past that may not involve anything illegal or anything that hurts anybody.”
But the panel said the Internet Age makes that all but impossible.
“Although her pornography career has concluded, the ongoing availability of her pornographic materials on the Internet will continue to impede her from being an effective teacher and respected colleague,” Judge Julie Cabos-Owen said in the 46-page decision by the Commission on Professional Competence.
The judges found Halas was continually deceitful about her nine-month porn career before she joined the school. She was featured in movies with titles like "Boobaholics Anonymous 2," "Super Size Me" and "This Butt's 4 U," their report said.
Her lawyer argued Halas was "honest and forthright, but was embarrassed and humiliated by her past experience in the adult industry.”
[Related: Teacher fired for porn past may lose pay]
Halas was fired after students and teachers found videos of her online under the nom-de-porn "Tiffany Six."
Student claims that the science teacher had been a porn star were initially dismissed after school administrators failed to turn up any images on the web, AP said. It turned out the school computers they were using were equipped with firewalls that filtered out any porn.
Teachers then showed them Halas' sex videos on their smartphones.
WLS-TV News reported in a behind-the-scenes interview posted on SmokingGun.com, Halas reportedly talked about the dangers of her double life.
"It's a little risky wouldn't you think?" the interviewer asks.
"It is risky, very risky for me," Halas replies. "I am a teacher."
Asked if she'd be fired if her other job was discovered, Halas reportedly replied "probably."
Schwab said Halas did not star in porn videos while teaching in the Oxnard School District. She went into it for eight months between 2005 and 2006 because of financial problems after her boyfriend left her, AP reported.
LA Weekly reported Halas earned about $18,000 during her short career and claimed she was forced into it to deal with an $82,000 student loan, credit-card debt and providing financial help for her parents. She said she was repeatedly contacted by a producer after joining MySpace in 2005.
LA Weekly said the panel's report suggested Halas left another teaching job in Simi Valley after a high school coach told his boss in 2007 that he thought he recognized her in an online porn video. She moved to Conejo Valley's school district and again resigned after another coach identified her in a porn video.
Canada is not without its own school-porn scandal.
The secretary at a Quebec City-area high school was fired in 2011 after 10 years on the job when a student recognized her in a pornographic film.
Samantha Ardente was suspended, then dismissed, even though she didn't deal with students in her job, CBC News reported. She was fired after school officials couldn't agree on whether to transfer her to another job. They acknowledged she'd done nothing illegal but her activities did not jibe with the values being taught at the school.
(CBS-Los Angeles image)