Prosecutor resigns amid video voyeurism investigation
A Florida prosecutor has resigned after a screaming woman at a Gainesville tanning salon accused him of using his cellphone to record her in her underwear from above the tanning room wall.
Assistant State Attorney William Ezzell of the 8th Circuit resigned on Tuesday, report the Gainesville Sun, First Coast News and News4Jax. A special prosecutor has been appointed to review the case and determine whether to file video voyeurism charges.
The 51-year-old woman told Gainesville detectives last week that she was in a tanning booth wearing only her underwear when she noticed that someone from the next room was holding a cellphone above the wall with a light indicating it was recording, the stories say. She screamed “What are you doing?” and called the person a Peeping Tom, according to the police report.
The man left the salon after the woman said she was calling police. The man was identified as Ezzell by his registration at the salon and surveillance video, the Gainesville Sun says.
Ezzell has worked in the prosecutors’ office since May 2002 and was Levy County division chief. He was on a prosecution team that recently obtained a conviction in a high-profile murder case. When News4Jax called Ezzell’s home, a woman who answered declined to comment.
