An Alachua County Public Schools janitor was arrested Tuesday for soliciting sex from a 14-year-old girl.
Justin Anderson, a 36-year-old Hawthorne resident, is being charged with lewd or lascivious conduct, according to the arrest report. Anderson was arrested at Joseph Williams Elementary School and booked into the Alachua County Jail Tuesday at 10:06 a.m.
The victim’s parents invited Anderson to their house Sept. 3, where he became drunk, the arrest report shows. At the end of the night, Anderson went to sleep on the living room floor.
But when everyone went to sleep, he went into the 14-year-old girl’s bedroom.
Anderson’s connection to the family has not yet been disclosed, but at the time of the incident, he was a janitor at the Joseph Williams Elementary School at 1245 SE 7th Ave., ACPS spokesperson Jackie Johnson said. He’s since been placed on administrative leave pending the results of the investigation.
When Anderson entered the girl’s room, she told him she was tired. Anderson told her he could “be her mattress,” before he called her beautiful and asked for a hug, court records show.
Anderson then told the victim he had a “surprise” for her and that she would “know what it [was] when [she] got up.” The girl told police Anderson referenced his knowledge of an incident in which she was caught looking at pornography, indicating she should “know what [he was] talking about because [she] looked it up.”
The girl asked Anderson to leave her room several times and texted her parents, but they did not respond because they were asleep, the arrest report shows.
During a later interview, the girl told police she believed Anderson was speaking about his “private parts” and he was trying to get her to engage in a sexual act. She believed he was “trying to do something more” and he wanted her to do “something weird,” court records show.
She also told police she was concerned he was “probably going to be touchy,” and “not like friendly touchy.”
Anderson told police Tuesday he was highly intoxicated and had no memory beyond standing in the kitchen of the girl’s home, outside her bedroom door and asking her for a hug, the arrest report shows. He told police his next memory was waking up in a neighbor’s vehicle Sept. 4 between 6 and 7 a.m. and returning to the girl’s home where he learned that he had “apparently made a pass” at her.
Contact Lily Kino at lkino@alligator.org. Follow her on Twitter @lily_kino.
Lily is a third-year journalism major with a concentration in environmental science covering criminal justice for The Alligator. Last semester, she served as the Santa Fe reporter. When she's not writing, you can find Lily on a nature walk, eating Domino's Pizza or spending time with her friends.
