Walter Johnson High School employee James Mulhern III faces 12 counts of sex abuse of a minor after police say videos show him recording students in a changing room.
A Maryland high school employee accused of secretly recording female students in a school changing room is facing additional criminal charges after investigators identified eight more alleged victims during an expanded investigation. James Mulhern III, an employee at Walter Johnson High School in Montgomery County, now faces 12 counts of abuse of a minor after investigators said newly recovered videos showed a total of 12 female students in various stages of undress.
A media services technician at Walter Johnson High School in Bethesda who was arrested in April is facing eight additional counts of sex abuse of a minor connected to videos and photos obtained in a search warrant. Judge Sherri Koch released James Mulhern III, 43, of Clarksburg on a $100,000 unsecured bond Wednesday.
Assistant State’s Attorney Erin Chapman told Judge Sherri Koch that Mulhern had a “perversive interest in his students” and should be held without bond because prosecutors are concerned about “potential grooming of other students.”
Koch released Mulhern with several conditions, including no contact with minors other than supervised contact with his 4-year-old son, no internet access and a requirement to avoid Walter Johnson High.
Mulhern’s defense attorney David Wooten said something different at the hearing.
Wooten said Mulhern has taken part in a “psychosexual evaluation” and was deemed a “low risk for recidivism.”
Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy said after the hearing Wednesday that the investigation is ongoing and prosecutors are considering rolling the two cases into one.
The case breaks down into two separate investigations spanning more than a decade.
Mulhern was later indicted on four counts of sex abuse of a minor due to the 2018 video having four victims present.
Another case involves recordings of students made in 2015 at the Bethesda campus found on a flash drive.
In the viral moment that sparked the investigation,
the investigation began after two students discovered a video camera in the control booth of Walter Johnson High School’s theater April 7. One of the students reviewed the memory card and found videos recorded inside the girls changing room before alerting school administrators.
The video shows an adult male placing the camera and leaving the room while it was recording. A short time later, teenage girls entered the room and began changing clothes for a theater performance.
A student emailed the videos to the school’s principal, who identified the man as 43-year-old James Mulhern III, a media services technician at the school.
Court documents obtained by WUSA say that Mulhern initially denied recording students during an interview with detectives. Upon showing him the recorded footage, detectives say Mulhern admitted he was the man setting up the camera in the video.
When detectives showed him evidence, he acknowledged more.
“Mulhern also admitted to having [an] inappropriate attraction to multiple students while working at Walter Johnson High School,” the court document reads.
Detectives executed search warrants at the high school and Mulhern’s Clarksburg home, where they recovered items of evidentiary value and seized several electronic devices.
Following Mulhern’s arrest in April, Montgomery County police said detectives with the department’s Special Victims Investigations Division seized “more than 100 computers, cell phones, tablets and other electronic media from the school and from Mulhern’s residence.”
A student at the school shared her reaction when the news broke.
“People are calling it disgusting. That’s what it is, heartbreaking,” said Walter Johnson High School student Gage Familant.
A victims’ rights expert weighed in on the impact of the recordings.
“This is stuff that you can never get back,” said victim’s rights expert Jennifer Storm. “This is actually footage of you being violated.”
Each count of abuse of a minor carries a maximum penalty of 25 years in prison under Maryland law. If convicted on all 12 counts, Mulhern could face up to 300 years behind bars.