A former teacher who secretly filmed boys using the restroom at the Texarkana school where he taught was sentenced to four years in prison Monday as part of a plea bargain in Miller County.
Shane Samuel Jones, 31, pleaded guilty to voyeurism and video voyeurism. He must register as a sex offender upon release.
Jones confessed to filming students while working as a teacher at Trinity Christian School in Texarkana while being questioned about an incident Nov. 26 in a men's bathroom at J.C. Penney in Central Mall in Texarkana, Texas. An 11-year-old boy told his parents that while in a stall, someone slipped a cellphone beneath the divider and took his picture.
The boy's father sent his son to notify store employees while the father made sure Jones would not leave the store without speaking to police. Jones was arrested several days later.
"He stated that he began videoing male students at his place of employment, Trinity Christian School, while they were using the toilets in the bathroom stalls approximately two years ago," the affidavit states.
Jones admitted to having approximately 10 videos on an old cellphone, authorities said. He also told police he filmed two male bathroom users at J.C. Penney on two occasions and five male bathroom users at the school on five occasions using an iPhone which was seized from him at the time of his arrest, authorities said.
Jones was fired from his job as a teacher at Trinity Christian because of the allegations.
A charge of invasive visual recording remains pending against Jones in Bowie County, Texas. At a hearing in February, 202nd District Judge John Tidwell refused to accept a plea bargain that included a term of probation, telling Jones that he might get probation from a jury but he wasn't going to get it from the court.