DANVILLE — On the morning of last March 13, a 17-year-old Monte Vista High School student had just parked her car on campus and was walking to class when she heard a man’s voice say, “Hi.”
When she turned, the girl saw a pants-less adult male sitting in a four-door sedan and very obviously masturbating in front of her. After a few seconds, she overcame her shock and headed into school, then wasted no time calling police.
Over the next 10 days, police not only identified a suspect, but linked him to several other similar indecent exposure incidents in Walnut Creek and Berkeley. When he was arrested, police say his phone showed a strong indicator that he’d driven to Danville looking to expose himself to a child: he allegedly searched for Monte Vista High School on Google Maps just eight minutes before the 17-year-old was accosted.
The suspect, identified in court records as 40-year-old Monroe Lebeau III, was charged May 26 with six counts of indecent exposure and one count of soliciting a lewd act, all misdemeanors. He bailed out of jail June 3, and since then has been listed as a suspect in an indecent exposure incident in American Canyon that occurred after he posted bail, authorities said.
Police are still going through Lebeau’s phone, which investigators said in court records has been found to contain thousands of videos of Lebeau aiming his cellphone camera up women’s dresses and skirts. Many of them inadvertently contained Lebeau’s own face, police say.
The charging documents accuse Lebeau of indecent exposure incidents that occurred between Feb. 27 to March 21, including the Monte Vista High exposure and several in Walnut Creek. One occurred March 14, when Lebeau allegedly accosted a woman who was walking alone, masturbated in front of her, and made a lewd gesture with his tongue.
One week later, Lebeau allegedly exposed himself to two women within two hours in Walnut Creek. The second incident involved Lebeau allegedly pulling up next to a woman who was driving with her 4-year-old child in the car, honking the horn to get her attention, then driving erratically away from the area when she took out her cellphone and began to photograph him and his car.
Lebeau has two prior convictions involving similar conduct, both from 2017, in Pleasant Hill. One involved him exposing himself to a woman, while the other was a conviction of using a device to record a person’s body or undergarments, court records show.
Lebeau is next due in court on June 21.
