2013 just hasn't been Florida Atlantic University's year. With James Tracy, professors stomping Jesus, and the naming rights handed over to a prison system, the school has just fielded one scandal after another.
And now we have "JERKING_BUD."
Yesterday, police announced 40-year-old Seth Thompson had been arrested on charges of video voyeurism. According to the arrest affidavit, the employee, who worked in the library, filmed guys in the facility's bathroom urinating and masturbating. He then posted the clips to porn sites under the JERKING_BUD handle, catchy little numbers with titles like "A college kid and his dad taking a leak at a public bathroom" and "My buddy jerking off in the stall next to me."
Police were tipped off about the whole thing when a student allegedly caught Thompson paying him too much attention in the bathroom one day. Another student came up to the first a few days later. A 30-second clip had been posted on Pornhub.com of the student peeing, he was told. The crime was reported to police.
So who is Seth Thompson? The man lives in Lake Worth. He worked at the university's Jaffe Center for Book Arts as a collection specialist, according to this website. Along with fellow Jaffe Center employee John Cutrone, Thompson owns a book printing business called Convivio Bookworks based in Lake Worth.
Online, however, Thompson kept up a number of user handles on porn sites as JERKING_BUD, including Xtube.com and yuvutv.com. Following the electronic bread crumbs, police were able to trace the handle back to Thompson. When police executed a search warrant at Thompson's home on August 14, the suspect admitted to secretly filming guys in the bathroom, then storing the clips on his FAU laptop.
"Thompson stated that he initially began recording these videos after seeing similar videos online, which gave him the impression that there are people who are enjoy [sic] viewing videos showing males masturbating and urinating," the police paperwork reads.
"He did not believe those video recordings to be serious in nature; instead, because of the anonymity of the victims, he downplayed his actions and attributed them to mischief."
Thompson resigned after the August sitdown with police. He now faces charges related to 13 videos. As of now, police have ID'd only one of the individuals caught on screen, so if you're a dude who's spent some time around the FAU library, you might want to do some awkward Googling, see if you, uh, recognize anything.
Send your story tips to the author, Kyle Swenson.
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