A female student was photographed by a stranger while she was showering in the first-floor bathroom of Diman House on Thurs., March 12, Department of Public Safety officials confirmed this weekend.
The alleged peeper was "a college-age guy that had been in Diman previously, as reported by residents of the house," according to Amanda Filiberto '11, vice president public relations of Kappa Alpha Theta, the sorority that occupies the first floor of Diman.
In an e-mail to The Herald, Filiberto wrote that the alleged peeper entered the bathroom on Thursday morning and tried to take pictures of the showering woman. According to an e-mail sent by sorority president Ellen Loudermilk '10 to members of Theta on Thursday morning and obtained by The Herald, he also tried to open the shower curtain before getting on his hands and knees to take pictures with a cell phone.
The woman was not hurt, according to Mark Porter, director of public safety for Brown.
The woman screamed, and the peeper left immediately after, running through the hallway and past several rooms before leaving the building, according to Loudermilk's e-mail, which went on to say that DPS officers arrived quickly after being called and took descriptions from Diman residents and the building's custodian.
The department has two witnesses, Porter said, and is working with a description of the alleged perpetrator. Porter called the matter under "active investigation."
"Detectives are working on it - interviewing students, following up on a couple of leads on the description that we have," he said.
Under Rhode Island law, "peeping" is considered disorderly conduct and is punishable by up to six months in prison and a $500 fine. University judicial policy defines sexual misconduct as "non-consensual physical contact of a sexual nature" and does not explicitly refer to peeping.
Loudermilk's e-mail indicated that similar incidents have happened elsewhere on campus before.
Earlier this semester, a man entered a women's bathroom while someone was using the facility, Porter said. The event is currently under investigation.
"We have had another report of a similar incident with a similar description, so we're following up on that as well," he said.
Though Thursday's matter is still under investigation, DPS will work to "get the word out" about the incident among students, Porter said.
"As a precautionary measure, we want students to know what happened," he said.
While DPS "does the investigative work," ResLife has worked with DPS and will continue to help in the effort to notify students and provide support to those who need it, said Dean of Residential Life and Dining Services Richard Bova.
Bova and Filiberto both emphasized the importance of taking precautionary safety measures. "I would ask that students continue to be as vigilant as possible in identifying strangers that are in their buildings," Bova said, adding that students should lock bathroom doors and be careful about letting strangers into dorms.
"We have taken the necessary precautions such as locking all bathroom doors, and making sure that no doors are ever propped open, so that hopefully this incident will not happen again in the future and other dorms can learn from it," Filiberto wrote. "This serves as a reminder that this can happen anywhere at anytime and all college students need to be aware of that."
