A New York City library employee arrested and charged with public lewdness last month will now be allowed to go topless at work, a federal judge has ruled.
Brenda W. Melon, 43, was arrested last month and charged with two counts of public lewdness after school children snapped a picture of her taking off her top while working at the Bronx Library Center.
Concerned parents brought the images of the topless library worker to the attention of the New York Police Department who later pressed charges.
“It’s been legal in the state of New York for women to be topless in public since 1992 and a library is a public space,” attorney Andrea Thomas argued in court.
“God blessed me with these bountiful breasts for all to see in all of God’s glory and these babies have got to breathe,” Brenda W. Melon told reporters visibly enthused by the ruling.
Melon, 43, also admitted that she could barely find any bra of her size and that it was much more comfortable for her to let them lay on the reception desk than to carry all that weight on her back.
“I used to hang them with rubber straps from the ceiling to relieve some weight from my back but it was pretty inconvenient,” she admitted.
Brenda W. Melon also says she likes the attention and that she gets to meet a lot of adults and children who ask her about her being topless and even who enjoy touching her breast while she is scanning the library books.
It has been legal in New York state for women to be topless in public since 1992 after a Court of Appeal’s ruling acknowledged that women have the same right as men to bare their chests in public.
