Lompoc Meter Reader Lets Gaze Wander

A meter reader was looking in on more than utility usage.

Former city meter reader Phillip Ornelas, 31, pleaded no contest to charges that for more than a year he peeped on a 15-year-old girl and videotaped her adult neighbors in their home through a hole in their backyard fence.

Ornelas pleaded to eight of the 14 misdemeanor charges against him, including three counts of annoying a child and five counts of peeking, said Santa Barbara County prosecutor John MacKinnon.

Each child-annoying charge carries a maximum of a year in jail, and a six-month jail term is applied to each peeking charge.

In addition to up to 5 1/2 years in prison, Ornelas will be required to register for life as a sex offender, make restitution to a victims fund and pay for the cost of psychological counseling sought by his three victims, MacKinnon said.

He will be sentenced April 24 by Superior Court Judge Eugene Huseman.

Ornelas was arrested Feb. 8 after the girl told police that he was watching her through a bedroom window. Ornelas allegedly watched the girl and her neighbors through a dime-sized hole in a backyard fence drilled by the city utility department to read water and electrical meters.

When officers approached Ornelas about 7 a.m. in the alley behind the girl’s home, Ornelas was in uniform and carrying a video camera. Although off duty, he told police he was checking meters.