Video voyeur is sentenced

COEUR d’ALENE — A former North Idaho College instructor and gay rights activist was sentenced Friday to 90 days in the local jail after pleading guilty to one felony count of video voyeurism.

Jonathan Downing, 35, was sentenced in Coeur d’Alene’s First District Court to no more than four years in prison, but Judge Lansing Haynes suspended the sentence, ordered Downing to spend three months in the Kootenai County jail and pay a $5,000 fine for what the judge called an unseemly undertaking.

“This was a criminal enterprise … to satisfy your own prurient interests,” Haynes said.

Although a presentence report, which measures a defendant’s likelihood to reoffend and gives judges sentencing recommendations, showed Downing was not a risk to society, Haynes said Downing’s sentence should deter others.

“This was a complete loss of a moral compass, and it went on for a long time,” he said.

Downing, who taught college chemistry, was arrested in June after accusations he videotaped his 20-year-old roommate and the man’s girlfriend in the bathroom of the home on the 1700 block of Nettleton Gulch Road in Coeur d’Alene that the victim shared with Downing.

The roommate found the films on a shared computer and located the camera in the bathroom before calling authorities.

At Friday’s sentencing, Downing admitted his actions were wrong. He said he wanted to apologize to the victims, who were not in court.

“I can’t believe I did it,” Downing said. “I don’t know if they would accept my apology.”

Deputy prosecutor Katherine Murdock asked the court for a prison sentence because Downing’s acts were purposeful, went on for months, and were not meant to satisfy Downing’s curiosity.

“That’s not justified by curiosity,” Murdock said. “That’s not justified by anything.”

The victim, Murdock said, feels guilt for Downing’s crime.

Coeur d’Alene police said the male victim, a former student of Downing’s, found a pinhole camera in a wall after becoming suspicious that he was being recorded. On a computer that both men shared, the victim “found secretly recorded videos of him and a female friend,” Coeur d’Alene Police Sgt. Jared Reneau said.

During an interview with police, Downing, who is gay, told investigators he had inadvertently recorded the woman, but admitted he intentionally placed the camera to covertly record his roommate in the bathroom.

Defense attorney John Redal said his client had no criminal record, and that an evaluation showed Downing was unlikely to reoffend. Downing took responsibility for his actions, but simply made a mistake. The videos were not distributed.

“He acted on an impulse,” Redal said.

Downing, who lost his job at NIC in the wake of the allegations, has since found a job in Spokane. Haynes ordered Downing to begin his jail term Feb. 28 and be employed full time while on probation.