Acquittal upheld for teacher who secretly videoed female students’ breasts
TORONTO — A high school teacher who used a camera pen to secretly video female students’ chest areas did so for sexual purposes, but his acquittal on voyeurism charges will nevertheless stand, Ontario’s top court ruled in a split decision on Thursday.
In dismissing a prosecution challenge to a lower court verdict, the Court of Appeal found the students had no reasonable expectation of privacy — a key element of the offence of voyeurism.
Police in London, Ont., charged the English teacher, Ryan Jarvis, over secret recordings he made in 2010 and 2011 of the students while he was chatting with them. The images, captured in various places in and around the school and lasting from seconds to a few minutes, involved 27 female students aged 14 to 18.
Another teacher spotted what was happening and alerted the principal, who observed the same conduct and called in the police.