San Francisco, CA July 27, 2014 (AcuteMania.net) – Mark Landis, 38, has been charged with 15 counts of invasion of privacy after being arrested and taken into custody on Wednesday. He was released on $100,000 bail. Landis, an accounting professor at San Francisco State University, was arrested and charged for surreptitiously recording male students using the restroom at his home.
Landis was known to invite male students to his home for parties on the weekend, where he plied them with alcohol. According to one of his students, “He was just the person that would host, and it was a safe place to go to. We basically hung out every single weekend for about two years, and we always hung out at his house because he always had a lot of alcohol.”
Last November, one of Landis’ male students discovered a flashing camera inside a tissue box that sat on the top of the toilet in the restroom at his house. The discovery, which occurred while the student was using the restroom, led him to remove the memory card from the camera to see what was on it. He discovered that Landis had recorded him and 14 other students urinating. The student then took the memory card to the police and reported the incident.
San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon told reporters, “I think it’s sick at many levels. The camera was basically pointing toward the toilet so he could film people’s genitals as they were using the restroom. We believe, given the ongoing investigation in this case, that there are probably many other victims.” He is asking other students, who believe that they may have been recorded, to come forward.
“You have an individual that has power and authority over these young kids that he invited to his home,” Gascon added. “There was a special relationship there–one of power, authority and trust—and he violated that.”
Another student said, “It scarred all of us. This was a close friend of ours. We could open up to him. He was a mature figure we could chat with and have conversations with. He always seemed like a nice guy, but now we’re wondering if he was just nice to us so we would invite more friends over.”