A man police say videotaped himself masturbating in his car in front of two Berkeley High girls has been charged with three misdemeanor counts of indecent exposure, according to court documents.
Curran Giddens, 38, of San Francisco, is scheduled to appear in court in Oakland on July 1 after being released on his own recognizance earlier this month. He had entered a not guilty plea in April after one incident, but was arrested and taken into custody on a new warrant on May 23. (He has since been released.)
According to the complaint, dated May 29, from the Alameda County district attorney’s office, Giddens has been charged in relation to incidents in Alameda County in December, February and April. If found guilty, Giddens would have to register as a sex offender.
According to court documents, Giddens was on probation at the time of his arrest in April due to a 2012 arrest in Berkeley related to masturbating in his car.
According to a report completed by Berkeley Police officer Melissa Kelly in May, police arrested Giddens on April 23 inside a black Volkswagen Jetta after he exposed himself to two girls walking home from Berkeley High: “Giddens had video in his possession at that time of an erect penis inside a car with a Volkswagen emblem on the steering wheel with teenage girls walking in the background.” (According to police, Giddens had used his cell phone to record the incident.)
After seeing him, the girls “became scared and ran off” according to another police statement, and Giddens later was arrested.
Kelly, in her report dated May 20, said two other girls had also identified Giddens from an incident on Dec. 20, 2012. Several days earlier, one of the girls had been walking near Acton Street and Bancroft Way when, according to Kelly, she saw a man parked in a black car: “Several blocks later, as she turned onto Acton Street from Bancroft Way, she saw the same man in the same car parked on the corner, and the man was staring intently at her. She told her dad about the incident.”
On Dec. 20, according to the report, the girl and a friend were walking on Allston Way near McKinley Street when she saw the man again: “A man in a black car drove slowly past, and victim #1 said, ‘Oh, no, he’s not safe.’ Victim #2 looked at the man in the car and saw that he was ‘masturbating.'”
Both girls independently picked Giddens out of a photo line-up at the Berkeley Police Department in May, according to Kelly’s report.
No further information was available about the February incident that was listed in the complaint. Albany Police said Thursday that Giddens did not appear to be connected to several other recent incidents reported this year in Albany and Berkeley.
Related:
Police seek help after indecent exposure arrest [05.04.13]
Police ask anyone with information about related incidents to call the department’s Sex Crimes Detail at 510-981-5735, or the non-emergency line at 510-981- 5900. Tipsters who wish to remain anonymous can call Bay Area Crimes Stoppers at 800-222- 8477 (TIPS).
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