Inset: Jack LaRoche (Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office). Background: The University of North Florida campus, where LaRoche is accused of assaulting a student with autism (Google Maps).
A man who allegedly claimed he was making content for his YouTube page is accused of pursuing a Florida college student with autism through a residence hall, trapping him in a bathroom stall and flicking him in the face.
Jack LaRoche has been charged with abuse of a disabled adult, false imprisonment and providing a false name to law enforcement.
According to a probable cause arrest affidavit, the encounter happened Aug. 22 at the University of North Florida. Police spoke with the victim, who said an unknown man began following him outside his dormitory. When the student went inside, the man — later identified by authorities as LaRoche — allegedly kept trailing him, the affidavit said.
The victim attempted to enter a friend’s room, but the friend was not there. He then ran into a bathroom and hid in a stall. Investigators said the suspect entered the stall next to him, looked over the partition and began speaking to him.
LaRoche allegedly moved into the same stall as the victim and started “flicking” him in the face, knocking his glasses off, police said. He then ordered the student to set a 10-minute timer on his phone and told him to remain in the stall until it went off. If the victim left early, LaRoche allegedly warned, he would “come back and get you.”
The student stayed in the bathroom until the timer expired because he was “too afraid to leave due to the suspect’s statements,” officers wrote. Afterward, he drove to the police station to report what had happened.
Officers later spotted LaRoche walking on campus. He allegedly identified himself as “Jack Jones” and said he was a student, though police noted he could not identify his dorm. He was arrested, and the victim later identified him as the person who assaulted him, according to authorities.
LaRoche eventually gave cops his real name and said he was on campus to shoot videos for YouTube and was just “f—ing around.” He denied assaulting the victim. He was taken to the Duval County Jail on a bond of about $22,500. His next court date is set for Sept. 14.
The campus newspaper, the UNF Spinnaker, reported LaRoche is not a student at the school.
The post Man chased college student with autism through dorm, followed him into bathroom and repeatedly flicked his face while making video for YouTube: Cops first appeared on Law & Crime.
