Jury Convicts Man For Vile Act With Elmo Doll

OCTOBER 12--A jury yesterday convicted a Michigan man of aggravated indecent exposure for using a Tickle Me Elmo doll to masturbate while he was inspecting a residence on behalf of a potential purchaser.

Kevin VanLuven, 60, was found guilty of the misdemeanor following a one-day trial in Oakland County Circuit Court. The jury acquitted VanLuven of malicious destruction of property, also a misdemeanor.

Judge Phyllis McMillen scheduled VanLuven’s sentencing for December 2. The indecent exposure count carries a maximum penalty of two years in prison and a $2000 fine.

VanLuven, who works as a home inspector, was arrested last year after the owners of a suburban Detroit home contacted cops to report that a nanny cam recorded VanLuven pleasuring himself inside the residence.

VanLuven was inspecting the Oxford Township home on behalf of a potential purchaser. The home’s owners had let VanLuven, another inspector, the buyers, and a real estate agent into the property.

When the inspection began, the owners and their two small boys left the three-bedroom house. After two hours had passed, homeowner Jaida Dodson remotely accessed her home security cameras to check on the progress of the inspection.

At a court hearing last year, Dodson testified that she saw VanLuven remove a Tickle Me Elmo doll that had been among stuffed animals stored in a small teepee tent in the bedroom of Dodson’s two-year-old son. VanLuven then allegedly “unzipped his pants and began masturbating in our son’s closet with his Tickle Me Elmo,” Dodson recalled.

The above surveillance still shows VanLuven holding the Elmo doll.

After Dodson called police, an officer confronted VanLuven at the residence. The cop reported that VanLuven “admitted to placing his penis in Elmo’s mouth, in the doll’s mouth” and “apologized and said he was ashamed.”

VanLuven subsequently sought to quash verbal and written confessions given to police, but a judge denied his motion to suppress those statements. (3 pages)