A 30-year-old Uber driver is accused of peeping through windows and stealing from Athens homes where University of Georgia students live, police said.
Patrick McElroy appeared on surveillance video with a camera of his own, student Kasey Baker told Channel 2 Action News.
“It’s just really creepy,” Baker said.
He was arrested Friday after allegedly taking photographs of a 19-year-old UGA student through her bedroom window at Towne Club apartments on Springdale Street, Athens-Clarke County police told the Athens Banner-Herald.
After McElroy was in custody, detectives linked him to a previously alleged peeping incident and other offenses at Towne Club and on Peabody Street.
He was charged Monday with an additional count of peeping Tom, plus first-degree burglary, loitering or prowling and obstruction of law enforcement officers, the newspaper reported.
Student Samantha Folk told Channel 2 she and her boyfriend heard McElroy as he scrambled to get out of the house through a back window during one of those burglaries.
“We heard shuffling down the stairs,” Folk said.
They found a roommate's window wide open.
“Everything had been taken,” Folk said. “Anything he could fit into a pillow case (or) backpack. It was scary.”
What made the burglary more frightening was that McElroy allegedly stole love notes and personal items.
“He also went through my personal journal, which was very violating,” Jessica Pickens said. “I don’t know why he would do that.”
Another UGA student, Kristin Brady, said her surveillance camera caught McElroy lurking around her windows before her home was burglarized of credit cards, prescriptions and “anything they (could) take.”
Brady told Channel 2 she recognized McElroy when he picked her up as an Uber driver about a week later.
“I think he was trying to get some information from girls,” Brady said. “(He was) just talking and gossiping trying to find out where everyone was going.”
A representative with Uber told Channel 2 they are looking into the case.
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