Booked
Jeremy Rothe-Kushel asked a tough question during a question period at a speech at a Kansas City, Mo., public library. In asking his question, Rothe-Kushel accused the United States and Israel of “state-sponsored terrorism.” After responding, the speaker wanted to move on, but Rothe-Kushel did not yield the microphone. Two people working security — one of them a moonlighting cop — grabbed him. Steve Woolfolk, library director of programming and marketing, intervened. “This isn’t how we handle things at the library,” Woolfolk said later. “For anybody, a police officer or someone else, to take it upon themselves to silence a person they disagree with, it’s not appropriate.” Both were arrested. Charges against Roothe-Kushel were dropped, but prosecutors brought Woolfolk to trial, even adding to the charges against the librarian at about the same time he was named to receive the Lemony Snicket Prize for Noble Librarians Faced with Adversity, and his library won an American Library Association award for courage. The judge acquitted him. “It was a public event,” the judge ruled. (AC/Kansas City Star) ...In Woolfolk’s space, no less.Original Publication Date: 24 September 2017
This story is in True’s book collections, in Volume 24.
This story is in True’s book collections, in Volume 24.
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