ok Im kinda confused here. They dont really make it clear but did he like set up his phone in the house knowing he was coming back, or was it like he was there she went to shower and he slipped his phone in there.

only because it begs the question... WHO THE HELL SHOWERS WITH A STRANGE MAN IN THEIR HOUSE.

Sounds like something you'd see on a Revenge of the Nerds sequel?

@Falconfire:

Same thing here. If he set it up, left and had some plan for getting it later, then he's a stupid scumbag. If he set it up because she was going to take a shower while he was there, then she's even more stupid.

@Falconfire: That was my first thought as well. Why oh why was she in the shower?

[Devil's Advocate] Maybe she wanted to be noticed by the tech and took a shower to call attention to herself? [/Devil's Advocate]

More details are needed, such as was there another member of the household there, and if so, how did the tech get near the shower? It would seem the daughter was there; so this guy apparently avoided a child who was curious enough to remove a SIM chip? Just a strange story at this point.

*correction, younger sister not daughter*

"Gentlemen, we have bush."

Couldn't he have picked a better looking woman to do this to?

*second correction (imadumbass)*

Watch the video.

Says he left the phone in the bathroom and hit the record button. She went to take a shower and noticed it behind the sink.

He put it in there and continued working. He was still there after they discovered it and took it to a Verizon store to find out what was on the chip. After viewing it, they called the cops and their mom stalled the tech until the cops arrived.

so she really DID take a shower while he was there. Doesnt make what he did right in the least but still you got to wonder what the hell she was thinking have a member of GEEK SQUAD there while she took a shower.

I mean GEEK is in the freaking name. While there are a number of us who get laid frequently, there are many more who have 200 gig HDs for things other than programs.

i wonder what kind of computer problem they were having that took long enough for them to identify the cellphone, run to a verizon store, verify a video on the sim chip, call the cops, and then stall him...

C'mon, they're geeks. Women view them as non-threatening. This probably would have been his first chance to see boobies.

Dumb and wrong, the man is an idiot and deserves everything he hopefully will get. However, unless he had a record or string of complaints I don't see how Best Buy/Geek Squad had any role in this other than having deep pockets.

@faust1200: I drink to dat!

Okay after RTFA it would seem the mother hired GS to fix the computer. The GS employee came over while the mother and two daughters were there. The printed story does not make clear the exact progression of events but the video story does.

I was one of the people that sent this story in as a tip.

(Edit: Not shown on the online video.) What I found most interesting is that Best Buy claims that this is the first that they are hearing of the recording. If Best Buy's claim is true, did the Geek thing that they would not find out???

Which cellphone models show a red light when they're recording video?

i just saw this story on the local LA news. mom hired Geek Squad. she was home with her two daughters when the tech showed up. while he was there, one of the daughters went to take a shower. which isn't strange, since the mom was home.

mom and daughters were at a press conference, reading prepared statements. from the way they explained it, sounded like the tech finished the job and left the house. however, it all happened while he was doing the job. they had time to discover the phone, go to Verizon + back, call the police and have him arrested BEFORE he left the house? really??

AND they've hired Gloria Allred?? homegirl has filed a lawsuit against the tech, Best Buy and Geek Squad. they're going for the big bucks!

the funny thing is, as soon as i saw this story, my first thought? dang! Consumerist would LOVE this. they HATE the Geek Squad.

Headline should have read: Geek sneaks peek; woman sues freak

Why would the Geek Squad guy go to all this trouble, when he can get videos of women showering from the Internet, legally, for free?

You are all assuming that he did it. His defence could be that he put his phone down and the woman took the phone, recorded herself showering an then called the police so she could have a big lawsuit.

Kinda like the finger in the Taco!

It depends on what else is on that phone.

Not only is it weird that she'd decide to shower while the tech is over, but it's weird that the tech supposedly set up the camera, and ouila, soapy nude action! I smell a rat.

To those wondering how the sequence of events went down, it's more than conceivable for the daughter to come down and say to the mother, "Hey, I'm going to go take a shower," and the tech reply, "Oh, before you do, do you mind if I use the restroom? I was going to go just after I finished this little thing." That way, guy knows that she's gonna take a shower and is able to plant the cell phone.

At least, that's how I'd do it...you know...if I did such things...which I haven't...I'll stop.

Well, so much for the whole "secret agent" routine. A REAL secret agent wouldn't have been caught.

So an employee of Best Buy recommends a woman use a separate company, and an employee of that separate company does something appalling, and so the woman sues... erm... Best Buy.

Ri-i-i-i-ight.

What this is really about is that she's gone to her lawyer, and the lawyer's asked, "Who has any money here? The pervy tech? Nope. Geek Squad? Nope. Best Buy? A-ha! Now all we've got to do is find a pretext for suing them".

If the action succeeds, its main effect will be to ensure no business ever recommends another company to its customers. "If you suggest I use another company - something from which you get no revenue and no benefit other than maintaining customer goodwill - I will then sue you if that other company screws up." Well, in that case, here's the telephone directory. You're on your own. Good luck finding someone who can help.

This happened in LA. There has to be some angle to this we're not getting. What's the bidding at for the video, anyways?

Carl Monday is not impressed.

@hemaphore: he was probably installing a nic card. you know those pci cards can be really tricky to put in w/o voiding a warranty!

seriously though, a wireless install/troubleshoot across 3 or 4 computers could take awhile - especially if you don't know what you're doing.

Who wouldn't notice a cell phone (blinking red light or not) sitting on their bathroom counter?

At the very least he should have pulled out all the tissues from the kleenex box on the toilet tank and poked a small hole through it, taped the camera to the inside and put all the tissues back on top of the camera like I did...

Wait. I mean didn't do.

Can someone please enlighten me?
I don't have a camera phone, but was under the assumption that they couldn't take more than a few minutes of video?

She obviously lives with her sister and her mother from the story. So she did take a shower while he was there, but it wasn't just the two of them.

And it's cool how they did all this investigating before busting him. Pretty slick, but you know he had to of known something was up. You don't just leave your camera phones video running, placed in a hidden location.

Despite watching the video twice, I still don't completely understand the timeline of events here. I have to give a thumbs down to the news affiliate for running this story without contacting Best Buy or Geek Squad. "Because we didn't have time" is NOT an excuse for poor journalism. BB should sue the network for running a story without giving them the opportunity to give their side of the story.

Also, is it legal to just remove someone's memory card without their knowledge or consent, take it to a store and view its' contents? Don't you, like, need a warrant to do that?

Was this guy using a hacked phone with a memory card or something? Otherwise, the thing wouldn't have been able to record nearly as much as she's claiming he did.

@Jmarsh04:

Actually only the police need a warent. A person not acting as "An agent of law enforcment" can violate most of your rights that law enforcement cant.

But hold on. This dude left the camera in the bathroom but didnt have the common sence to retrive it when she was done? Furthermore, he HAD to know something was up. Especially when the daughters left and the mom was stalling him.

IMO, something's up.

That wasn't the video I was looking for.

After thinking about it a bit more, what if he really did use the bathroom and left his phone on the counter, not because he thought he might get some voyeur-vid, but because he used it while in there and just set it down without thinking about it. I know I've done that before at friends' houses.
Then, what if the girls found the phone and videotaped big sister in the hopes of blackmailing him or getting money from Best Buy.
This whole story just sounds too fishy. Everything from how they hired the tech to the sister being smart enough to remove the chip and take it to a store to get it played, but not smart enough to just play the video back on the phone right then and there in the bathroom.

@markwm: Uh, Anno 2007 almost all high end phones will record as much video as they can store. My phone will store almost 2 hours of video.

Not to distract from the obvious questions of why she was showering when strangers are in the house, but why exactly is she suing geek squad or best buy? if he had no prior record, they had no way of knowing he was a perv, and therefore should have no monetary responsibility.

Oh, right, because Gloria Allred is representing them, that's why.

sounds like bullshit to me, I know the phone they are talking about, and the damn screen would be on while recording video. Like would show exactly what it was recording. There is no little red light on it, just a little red dot on the screen that's 3'x1' THAT SHOWS EXACTLY WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING AT.

Sounds extremely fishy to me, but then again, the details on the story are sketchy. If he left the phone at the house, anything could have happen. Unfortunately, he's being trounced as guilty already.

If there is video of him placing strategically the phone though, that would be a good sign that they are right, and the guy was some screws off kilter.
-John.

@scoobydoo: I know they can store a lot of video, but most of them still cut off after a minute or so of continuous recording.

I have heard that the Geek Squad uses Verizon's VX 6700 for their cell phone. It is a PocketPC based phone with micro SD card slot. It will record video as long as there is room to store it so it isn't impossible to record a lot of video. While recording a red dot does flash on the screen, not on the phone itself. Most likely they just didn't know how to work the phone so they popped out the SD card.

JMarsh noted, "Also, is it legal to just remove someone's memory card without their knowledge or consent, take it to a store and view its' contents? Don't you, like, need a warrant to do?"

You might need a warrant if you were law enforcement; however this was a victim preserving evidence which they had (strong) reason to believe would be destroyed had they not 'impounded' it. Taken from another angle; the card had no information on it (that we are aware of) that belonged to the technician -- instead, it had information on it that belonged to the victim (her nudidity). The only property that was clearly the technician's was the physical card itself -- which I'm sure he can file a claim against her for in the 'theft' of.

But keep in mind that our rights against unreasonable search and seizure do not apply from one citizen to another -- only against law enforcement procedure and personnel.

@warchild: To each his own. I find her to be pretty attractive.

@etherag: That might have something to do with it, but they are correct for suing the employer of the offender since the crime was committed while on the job. It's just like suing Exxon for the Valdez oil spill. When on company time performing company jobs, the employer is responsible for the actions of the employee. Hence the need for heightened background checks, etc.

Suing the guy I get, but Best Buy and Geek Squad? Maybe her sister wouldn't agree to slice off a pinky to plant in their fast food, so they got Best Buy on the phone.

@markwm: Everything from how they hired the tech to the sister being smart enough to remove the chip and take it to a store to get it played, but not smart enough to just play the video back on the phone right then and there in the bathroom.

I agree it seems that we have a case of two sisters looking to make a quick buck from a large retail chain (Read: Gold diggers). And without regard to what it might do to some innocent geeks reputation.

I wonder if the lady's last name is Stiffler? I think she ought to be sued for being dumb as crap.

I'm wondering what's up with all the hate directed at the girl on here. Imagine if it were your mom or sister that this guy took video of.

Seriously something is wrong in the state of Denmark here. So this young woman announces she's going to go shower -- in front of the GeekSquad guy -- and he says "wait, let me please go use your bathroom first" and emits an evil laugh. So he slips into the bathroom first, "plants" a camera in plain view, leaves. Then the young woman come in and takes a shower. This should strike most as a bit odd. Did the house have only one bathroom? Is it possible she would announce this and he'd worm his way in there before her? Okay, it's possible but strange.

Then, I agree with this point, why does she notice this and then remove the chip to take it to Verizon? Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I thought only AT&T-Cingular, T-Mobile and some Sprint phones have chips that are removable. I thought all Verizon phones were programmed. Was the chip a memory card? And why not just watch it right then and there? That seems simple.

The answers could be that she couldn't work the phone, wanted to have a real "legit" reason to call this a crime and so went to Verizon for "verification" of the evidence -- must've been an exciting day for that Verizon tech. But it all seems suspect. And yes, most suspect of all is Allred's arrival on the scene. Reminds me of Seinfeld episode with Kramer smoking. Go for the deep pockets.

Something smells fishy. :P

@AcilletaM: Who's Matellica? Never heard of them.

Actually, I'm a little confused by a part of this, and here's why. She says she saw a red recording light from the phone, right? As a former GS Double Agent (yeah, it's really the title) I can tell you it wasn't taken on a GS phone. We use PPC-6700s, which don't have any outward indication that they're recording. On top of which, those are a little big to try and hide behind something... something doesn't smell right here.

I have to agree, it seems a little far fetched, but not beyond the realm of reason.

I mean, unless he does this all the time, which begs the question, how many people shower with strange tech people in their house? Then he'd have to be quick thinking to set all this up before she got into the shower. Still it's not impossible...

"Mom, I'm getting a shower then heading to a friends"

"Could you feed the dog first please"

"'K"

So not impossible, but a little unlikely.

Still that's why there are courts I guess. They could publish the video, plus any other evidence and we could have a trial by internet, but that seems a little unfair on the girl, if she is an innocent victim.

Of course if she isn't, she'd better not have made eye contact with the camera, which is what everyone but trained actors do when they are being filmed.

Time will tell I guess.