Former Elberon librarian convicted of soliciting vandalism, criminal mischief
TOLEDO — The weeklong trial of former Elberon Public Library Director Bailey Anne Jenkins concluded on Friday as a Tama County jury found her guilty of solicitation to commit a felony and second degree criminal mischief after a group of children ransacked and vandalized the facility on May 22, 2024, her final day of employment there.
Once the prosecution had called its witnesses to the stand and rested on Wednesday afternoon, closing arguments were set to begin the following morning. On Thursday, however, defense attorney Scott Hunter announced that Jenkins herself planned to testify, which ended up taking most of the day between her initial questioning and cross examination from Tama County Attorney Brent Heeren on behalf of the prosecution.
Hunter asked Jenkins to introduce herself to the jury, and she described herself as an individual who had moved around the country as a child and spent her entire life attempting to “make a difference” in the world, taking jobs as a tutor, working for nonprofits and becoming a CNA until a disability — severe depression — prevented her from continuing in that role.
After undergoing several rounds of Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT), which caused major memory loss, Jenkins and her family moved to Elberon from Belle Plaine five or six years ago. In her search for “pocket change” while collecting a social security disability check, she eventually sought employment with the community’s public library and was hired in October of 2023 to work eight hours a week.
When she took the job, Jenkins said she explained to board member Lorie Kesl that she was transgender but had “very conservative” beliefs on the matter and felt it should not be known to the children she worked with at the library.
“That’s my private life. I’m out there to do a job, not get political with these kids. It’s not what I’m here for,” Jenkins said.
In December of 2023, she returned to the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics for another round of ECT, but the treatment failed. While she was in the hospital, Jenkins said, the situation between herself and the library’s board of directors began to deteriorate as she was notified that she would need to take on 20 hours a week and become the director with another librarian departing.
Feeling unprepared to do so, Jenkins testified that she told the board she would understand if they needed to replace her but would continue to work in the meantime. On Feb. 14, she said the kids from the afterschool program learned she was transgender, and she told them she had mental issues, was going through treatment, and any further questions should be addressed between the children and their parents.
Despite a few objections related to relevance from Heeren, Fisher allowed Hunter to proceed with his line of questioning, and he and the defendant eventually began to discuss the events leading up to the incident on May 22. Jenkins received an email about the state of the library that she interpreted as an attack and responded to Kesl “unprofessionally” in a way that could’ve gotten her fired, she admitted.
Jenkins said she arranged a meeting with the board to apologize, but no one showed up – and subsequent attempts to apologize were also unsuccessful. On May 22, she received another critical message from a board member, and Jenkins subsequently called her father, telling him she couldn’t handle the stress anymore and intended to file a civil rights complaint against her employer.
“I was miserably sad. I felt like I was letting those kids down because the library had had issues for a long time finding a consistent librarian, and I felt like they were gonna go through that one more time and I was letting them down,” Jenkins said.
The kids at the library gathered around to console her as she cried and explained that it would be her last day on the job. About 10 minutes later, one of the children began to climb on a bookshelf, and another pushed items off of the STEM cart. Jenkins said she was asked a question she interpreted to mean “Can we destroy the library?” Her response was that she was beyond caring about what they did.
As the situation escalated, Jenkins went into a supply closet multiple times to search for a necklace, help a child look for her cell phone and let each child pick out a prize. She said she tried to stop the kids from throwing glitter, but once one of them did, she “gave up” on corralling them and instead turned her attention to typing up and submitting her resignation letter.
From there, Jenkins began to take screenshots of what was happening on her phone and recorded a video to protect herself, reiterating in her testimony that she had stopped one of the kids from using the fire extinguisher.
“I honestly feel that I did my absolute best to prevent actual damages because if things had gone the way of them just dumping things out, they would (just have to) go in there and clean it up. There would have been just sort of like a kid with a messy room and they would’ve gotten grounded by their parents,” she said.
On June 3, she attended the Elberon City Council meeting to formally resign from her position, which resulted in a tense, expletive-laden exchange between Jenkins, the council and the mayor. On June 28, Jenkins was interviewed by Tama County Deputy Cole Savage at her home, and the following day, seven felony criminal charges were filed against her.
After about 40 minutes of questioning from Hunter, Heeren’s cross examination began with basic details about Jenkins’ life and employment status. The prosecutor then asked her if she felt that she was the actual victim in the case, and she responded that she, the children and the taxpayers of Elberon were all victims, citing the fact that she had been outed by her employer as trans to the community.
She also disputed the assertion that she had manipulated the children in any way, and Jenkins explained some of the issues between herself and the board. In some instances, she said she was yelled at over things that “weren’t a problem,” and board members would discuss employer-employee matters in front of the children.
Concerns were raised over “PDA” (public displays of affection) regarding an instance in which she kissed her boyfriend at the library in the presence of the children after one of them had asked about it. On another day, she explained Spanx to a child who asked a question about underwear and chafing, and Kesl told Jenkins she needed to be careful about her words because kids can easily misinterpret words.
As it related to the May 22 incident, Heeren asked Jenkins why she didn’t report the damage to law enforcement after it happened, but she said she passed the information along to her direct supervisors, the members of the library board, and cast doubt on the accuracy of the damage estimate of $17,922.95.
Heeren pressed Jenkins on whether the people of Elberon and the parents of the children had entrusted her with a responsibility over them, and he also wondered what she meant in a message to the board announcing her resignation that said “You made this bed. Now sleep in it.”
When Heeren asked if she was angered by the actions of the children that day, Jenkins said she was merely disappointed but again cast doubt on the severity of the damages. She also asserted that inaction was not the same as allowing what happened and said she couldn’t see some of the events unfolding inside the library because of where she was situated and the fact that she wasn’t wearing her glasses for at least some of the time.
After a recess, the recording of Jenkins addressing the city council on June 3 and the heated subsequent exchange was played for the jury.
“The lack of professionalism is actually astounding to me here. In my entire life as an employee, I’ve never felt so undervalued, so disliked and so plotted against as I have in this job, but I stayed for the kids because the kids deserve stability,” she told the council.
After calling for changes with the board and the library as a whole, she was told her check was being held, and legal action was being pursued against her. From there, the conversation rapidly descended into a profanity-laced argument over who was responsible for the vandalism of the library.
In concluding his cross examination, Heeren exhibited records of the civil rights complaint Jenkins filed against the Tama County Sheriff’s Office alleging that the interview conducted on June 28 was intentionally delayed due to her memory issues, which is separate from the one she is pursuing against the city of Elberon and the library related to her gender identity. Both are still pending with the Iowa Civil Rights Commission.
He also recapped the defendant’s response when the events transpired, asked if drama “followed her around” wherever she went and inquired about the nature of her relationship with the children and what responsibility she felt she had over them.
“They seem to be blaming you,” Heeren said of the children.
“Again, that’s a case of accepting responsibility for your actions, and if their parents are not going to enforce that, I don’t know what I can do,” Jenkins replied. “I can’t say I blame kids. That’s just in the nature of a kid to be afraid of consequences. But I hope, yes, that they will accept responsibility for their actions.”
Closing arguments
In his closing argument, Heeren repeatedly returned to the phrase “Bailey’s World,” arguing that Jenkins consistently failed to take responsibility for her actions and “controlled and manipulated” the children. He asked jury members to imagine themselves in the shoes of the parents of the children, a library board member, a city council member or even just a resident of Elberon in general.
The focus, he said, should remain on the damage done to the library on May 22 and not on the employment disputes between Jenkins and the board or her gender identity, and Heeren used the line from the message Jenkins sent to the board to describe her situation: “You made this bed. Now sleep in it.”
Conversely, Hunter reiterated that while Jenkins did not stop the children from carrying out the acts of vandalism, he didn’t feel it amounted to encouraging or soliciting it — urging the jury to consider “legality, not morality.”
The jury reconvened on Friday morning and deliberated before returning a guilty verdict by noon on both charges, which constitute Class D felonies. After the ruling, Heeren issued a statement to the T-R that afternoon.
“Trials require a jury to (1) determine where the truth lies between conflicting versions of a situation and (2) apply the truth as found by the jury to the relevant legal principles provided to the jury by the judge in the form of instructions. After a fair trial, the jury in State v. Jenkins rendered a guilty verdict in conformity with the law and the weight of the evidence,” he said. “The jury spent five days, including deliberation, listening to testimony of six children, law enforcement officers, the chair of the Elberon City Library, and Bailey Jenkins, the defendant; in addition to watching several video recordings, playing audio clips, and studying photos (and) documents. The Office of the Tama County Sheriff, the prosecution, and victims are satisfied that justice was served by the jury verdicts of guilty.”
At presstime, Hunter had not responded to a request for comment.
Sentencing has been set for Thursday, Feb. 27 at 3 p.m