Bathroom peeper now faces child porn charges
A Ferndale man charged last month with secretly recording video of five women in the bathroom of a house was arraigned Monday on new charges involving child pornography.
Tyler Tierney, 29, surrendered himself to police and was arraigned in Ferndale
43rd District Court accompanied by his attorney Kimberly Stout.
Ferndale police said the new child pornography charges stem from videos police found while they were investigating the suspect on the criminal bathroom video surveillance allegations.
Tierney is charged with four counts of possessing pornographic videos considered aggravated child sexually abusive activity. He is further charged with using a computer to commit a crime.
“We do not believe he facilitated any of this,” Ferndale police Officer Jillian Mahlmeister said of the videos. “It is unclear if he downloaded or purchased” the videos
hile investigating the suspect on allegations that he placed a hidden camera in a bathroom that showed five women naked from the waist down, police seized the suspect’s cell phone and laptop computer.
Five videos on his MacBook computer involve what police call “known children,” meaning they were obviously underage.
Mahlmeister said there were also 156 videos on the suspect’s cell phone.
“It is clear in a number of these videos there are children under the age of 17,” Mahlmeister said.
What is less clear is how many of the videos on the cell phone can be verified as children or adults.
Each for the four felony counts of child sexually abusive activity is a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison and a $125,000 fine. Using a computer to commit a crime is a 20-year felony.
Tierney’s bond was set at $10,000, 10 percent, Monday.
He was freed on personal bond when he was charged last month in connection with the bathroom videos police said he made. The videos in both sets of charges predate Tierney’s arrest, police said.
Police started working on the cases after they received a complaint from a woman who came across one of the bathroom videos in July.
She was one of the five women who were video recorded, police said. Investigators ended up interviewing all five women.
The camera Tierney used was on the floor near the toilet and was a small device with a memory card in it, police said.
Tierney was interviewed by detectives before he was charged with making the bathroom videos.
During a swear-to hearing in court in October a Ferndale detective said the suspect confessed to making the bathroom videos.
Each of the five charges in that case is a five-year felony. Tierney has been arraigned for trial already on those charges in Oakland County Circuit Court.
Police on Monday said Tierney made no admissions in the new child pornography related allegations.
He is due back in Ferndale court for a probable cause conference at 1 p.m. Dec. 21.