A former custodian at Sunset Ridge School pleaded guilty to 11 counts of unauthorized videotaping and was sentenced to four years in prison, more than six years after police say he hid a camera inside a school bathroom and recorded students and staff without their knowledge. David Garcia-Espinal will receive credit for more than 230 days he has already spent in custody.
Garcia-Espinal was first charged in January 2020 but evaded police for years before he was finally arrested in Los Angeles in February 2026, according to CBS News Chicago. Authorities believe he fled the country before his arrest, the station reports. Police said he hid a video camera in the Sunset Ridge School bathroom in 2020 and used it to record students and staff without their knowledge or consent.
The device that triggered the investigation was discovered by a Sunset Ridge employee on Jan. 14, 2020, who found a cellphone taped inside a trash can in a staff bathroom and still recording, according to The Record North Shore. The following day, investigators identified Garcia-Espinal as the suspect and obtained a felony arrest warrant, per the Lake & McHenry County Scanner.
A Long Employment History at the School
Garcia-Espinal worked as a custodian at Sunset Ridge School in Northfield through the Smith Maintenance Company between 2015 and 2020, the station's report notes. In 2016, he also took on a second job at the school as a cook through OrganicLife, giving him regular access to the building beyond his custodial duties.
School officials said there were no prior complaints about Garcia-Espinal during his time at the school, and both vendors that employed him had conducted criminal background checks that turned up nothing, according to Edward Strange as cited in the CBS Chicago report. The school district relied on those third-party vendors to screen Garcia-Espinal rather than conducting its own independent check.
District Acknowledges Gaps in Screening
In the aftermath of the discovery, District 29 officials said the law was unclear about whether fingerprint-based background checks were required for Garcia-Espinal given his role at the school, according to the Chicago Tribune. The district also acknowledged that its administrators did not apply best practices for initiating fingerprint-based criminal background checks for vendor employees who had direct daily contact with students, the Tribune reported. Separately, The Record North Shore reported that the background checks completed and provided by the vendors did not reveal any criminal convictions, and the school did not conduct any additional background review of its own.
The district has since changed its policies. It now requires all private vendor staff to undergo fingerprint-based background checks, annual registry searches, and direct supervision, according to a separate CBS Chicago report on the case.
Teachers Pursued Lawsuits Over the Recordings
By March 2020, 14 Sunset Ridge teachers had filed lawsuits related to the hidden camera, according to an attorney cited by the Chicago Tribune. The companies that employed Garcia-Espinal were accused of failing to conduct adequate background checks before hiring him.
A Pattern Stretching Back More Than a Decade
Court and police records reviewed by CBS News Chicago point to a history of similar conduct well before the Sunset Ridge case. In 2010, Garcia-Espinal was caught on two separate occasions taking pictures of women while they were urinating in a restroom at a Northbrook Mall movie theater, and he was banned from the mall as a result.
In 2012, he admitted to entering a woman's bathroom at the Regal Theater in Glenview to masturbate, and he admitted to doing the same thing at the Northbrook theater. That same year, he pleaded guilty to identity fraud and was sentenced to probation; in 2013, he was fined for violating that probation.
Caught Again in Los Angeles
Garcia-Espinal's alleged pattern reportedly followed him even after he fled Illinois. A Los Angeles restaurant owner said Garcia-Espinal had worked for him under an alias the prior year, and that a customer found a camera recording inside the restaurant's bathroom. He allegedly fled as police were called to the restaurant, evading capture until his eventual arrest in February 2026 brought the six-year manhunt to an end.
