A 57-year-old man sentenced Monday to 45 days in jail for publicly masturbating last year on a MAX train is suspected of also mastubating on a TriMet bus one day before entering his guilty plea last month, court records show. The new charges were filed the same day as his latest sentencing.
Monday’s sentencing marks the second time David W. Besthoff has been convicted of public indecency. He admitted to the act in June 2000 and sentenced to a year and a half of probation, court records show.
A judge ordered his probation revoked in January 2001 and he was sentenced to one year in jail. The circumstances of that case and the revocation are not clear from available court documents.
Charges were filed Monday in connection with another case accusing Besthoff of masturbating in front of an 11-year-old girl on a TriMet bus on May 30. He is accused of public indecency, endangering the welfare of a minor, interfering with public transportation and indecent exposure.
According to a probable cause affidavit, the girl reported to police that she was on a Line 17 bus when a man later identified as Besthoff was masturbating while sitting near her. Besthoff told the girl she was pretty and that he “couldn’t help himself,” the court documents said.
The girl said she’d been on her way to ice skating practice at the time, but instead got off the bus and caught another bus back home.
A Portland police officer viewed surveillance footage from the bus showing Besthoff speaking to the girl and touching his exposed genitals, the affidavit said. He was also identified via the video footage.
Besthoff appeared in Multnomah Circuit Circuit Court the next day and pleaded guilty to public indecency in the case that occurred last year, court records show. He admitted to masturbating separately in front of two women while riding on a MAX train in downtown Portland on Aug. 8, 2018.
He was arrested in that case four months later after a Portland police officer who’d seen the surveillance footage in those incidents recognized Besthoff as he was standing on a MAX platform, court records said.
A judge also sentenced Besthoff to five years of probation Monday. His probation conditions include no contact with any of the victims, no travel on TriMet without approval from a probation officer, and no inappropriate contact with anyone. He must also perform 80 hours of community service unless he gets a full time job within six months, enter and complete a sex offender treatment program and pay for any counseling, therapy, treatment or medical costs incurred by the women affected in the case.
-- Everton Bailey Jr.
ebailey@oregonian.com | 503-221-8343 |@EvertonBailey
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