Jordan School District bus driver booked for investigation of voyeurism; district says he is no longer employed

HERRIMAN — A Jordan School District bus driver was booked into the Salt Lake County Jail on Wednesday for investigation of two counts of voyeurism and one count of using a wireless device while driving, and the district says he has since been fired 12.

KSL reported the booking from a Herriman Police Department affidavit 1. KUTV reported the counts as two counts of voyeurism involving the recording of a child under 14, a third-degree felony, and using a wireless device while operating a vehicle, a class C misdemeanor 2. Both accounts describe an arrest and a booking for investigation; neither reported Wednesday that a charge had been filed 12.

The Ledger is not naming the driver, the girl or the school, and is withholding her age and the clothing detail in the affidavit, under its standards on private individuals in crime coverage and on minors.

According to the affidavit, the driver was at the wheel of a bus carrying children on Oct. 8 when he held his phone near his lap and turned its camera toward a girl riding on the bus 12. The recording runs 33 seconds, and the video shows the bus moving while he drives, KSL reported from the affidavit 1.

The case reached the district through his family. The video appeared in a Google account he shares with his wife, KSL reported; when she confronted him, he said he would erase it, report himself to the school district and resign 1. When he did not report himself, his wife asked their daughter to report the incident and give the video to district officials, on Tuesday, October 20, according to the two reports 12.

A district spokeswoman told KSL that once the district learned of the allegations it reported the case to Herriman police immediately and removed him from his bus driving duties, and that he has since been fired 1. Herriman police obtained a search warrant for his phone and found the original video plus a second video of the same child among his deleted videos, according to the affidavit as reported by KSL 1. KUTV reported that officers asked that he be held without bail, citing a statement in the affidavit that if he were ever in trouble with the law he would "just fly home to Italy and live with his mother" 2.

The district runs its own bus service rather than contracting it: its transportation department lists 291 buses, 130 of them compressed natural gas, and home-to-school service for about 18,726 students each day 3. It listed 225 bus drivers and 22 bus attendants, and in October its drivers were in every elementary school in the district teaching students to board, ride and evacuate a bus 34.

No charging decision appeared in either report, and neither identified the route the bus was on, the school it served or how many children were aboard beyond "a school bus full of children" 12.