Burge’s ‘Peeping Tom’ pleaded guilty to burglary and invasion of privacy

Remember the creepy guy who took videos of a female student showering in Burge?

He’s officially been charged.

The original incident

This past February during second semester of the academic school year, a man not affiliated with the University of Iowa checked into Burge Residence Hall as the guest of a student and managed to find his way into the upper living area of the building. He roamed the hallways of Burge until he came across a dorm room with its door propped open. Seeing no one inside, he entered the room and stole a university ID and a room key. Here at the University of Iowa, student ID’s possess the capability to allow entrance into residence halls once doors are locked, and room keys double as keys to gender specific bathrooms within the living areas.

On the evening of February 15th at about 9pm, a disturbance was reported to university police in which a female student in a Burge women’s restroom discovered a man hiding in a stall and recording her showering on his cellphone. When a university police officer arrived on the scene and cornered the man in the restroom, they struggled before the man fled the residence hall and escaped into Iowa City.

Burge Residence Hall at the University of Iowa

While the man was still unidentified, Coralville police responded to an incident at Target in Coralville the next day, February 16th. Officers found a man inside the women’s dressing room at the store where he had reportedly been videotaping a woman changing on his cellphone. Once the man was arrested, he was identified as 23-year-old Robert Hightower from Coralville, Iowa, the same man who had evaded police at Burge Residence Hall the previous day back on campus at the University of Iowa.

Hightower was taken into police custody and booked at the Johnson County Jail that night on February 16th. At the time, he faced charges of invasion of privacy, third degree burglary, assault on a police officer, criminal trespass, simple assault, interference with official acts and third degree harassment.

Robert Hightower’s mugshot from his booking at Johnson County Jail on February 16th

What’s going on now

Yesterday, October 20, Robert Hightower, now 24, pleaded guilty to one count of second degree burglary and three counts of invasion of privacy. It is reported that charges of a second count of second degree burglary and one count of assault on a police officer have been dismissed in the case.

Hightower confessed that after stealing the university ID and room key, he entered women’s restrooms in Burge Residence Hall not once, but three times, on February 12th, 13th and 15th, the 15th being the evening he was caught recording a student showering. Hightower went as far as showing Johnson County police the videos of the student that he had recorded on his cellphone.

Hightower’s sentencing will not be light. Second degree burglary is classified as a Class C felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Invasion of privacy is classified as a serious misdemeanor and punishable for each count by up to 1 year in prison. Additionally, it is reported that Hightower already has two arrests on his record, and had been banned earlier in 2015 from the Target in which he was arrested at for shoplifting.

Hightower’s sentencing hearing will be held later this year on November 28th.

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