Nursing Student Wins Facebook Placenta Pic Case

Doyle Byrnes can return to school, says judge
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 7, 2011 12:17 PM CST
Nursing Student Wins Facebook Placenta Pic Case
This is a placenta, but not the one Doyle Byrnes posted on Facebook.   (©goldberg)

Apparently it is OK to post pictures of yourself posing with someone else’s placenta on Facebook, at least according to one federal judge. Doyle Byrnes, the nursing student who was expelled after doing just that, won her case against Johnson County Community College and will be allowed to resume her studies there if she wishes, the Kansas City Star reports.

The other three students who were expelled alongside Byrnes will also be allowed to return, says the college president, who added that the school is disappointed with, but will not contest, the ruling. The judge found that because the students got permission from an instructor to take the photo, what they did with it afterward was irrelevant. He also noted that no patient's privacy had been violated because there was no indication where the placenta came from.
(More placenta stories.)

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