Rice man pleads guilty to restroom video recording

Apr 13, 2012 (St. Cloud Times - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- A Rice man faces up to 90 days in jail when he's sentenced after pleading guilty Thursday to placing a cellphone in a restroom at Crossroads Center that was used to shoot video of people using the facility.

Joshua John LaValle, 25, pleaded guilty Thursday to one felony and four gross misdemeanor counts of interference with privacy. He admitted placing the phone in a unisex restroom at Crossroads on Nov. 25.

Police initially said that as many as eight victims were recorded by the cellphone, which was found at about 9:40 p.m. Nov. 25 by a mall employee at the end of the Black Friday shopping day. The phone was found propped up in the baseboards under a sink in one of two family restrooms at the mall.

The cellphone had been placed in a position to record women's intimate parts in several of the videos, according to the complaint.

A court complaint charging LaValle indicates that it also recorded something more incriminating -- a video of LaValle himself placing the cellphone in the bathroom.

Lavalle also pleaded guilty Thursday to a felony drug charge.

A review of the video on the phone showed the phone had been moved from one family restroom to the other and had recorded people in both restrooms. One of the convictions against LaValle involved the person who found the phone and reported the incident to police.

Officers used an administrative subpoena to get the telephone number belonging to the cellphone and learned it belonged to Lavalle. His driver's license photo matched the image of the person in the video recorded while the phone was placed in the restroom as well as several other photos on the phone's camera, according to the complaint.

There were at least five videos on the phone, and all of the people in the videos "have no idea that they are being recorded," according to the complaint.

LaValle violated the conditions of his release on the charges, and Stearns County District Court Judge John Scherer raised LaValle's bail to $150,000 unconditional or $100,000 with conditions after the guilty pleas.

Lavalle is scheduled to be sentenced June 22.

___ (c)2012 the St. Cloud Times (St. Cloud, Minn.) Visit the St. Cloud Times (St. Cloud, Minn.) at www.sctimes.com Distributed by MCT Information Services

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