A Valencia man was sentenced Thursday, Jan. 4, to serve 24 months of probation and is being sued for allegedly hiding two cameras in his home to take explicit photos of his wife’s 19-year-old cousin while she was house sitting while he and his wife were on vacation last summer.

In a plea agreement, Jacob Thiel, 28, of Valencia, was sentenced to serve 12 months of probation including three months of house arrest, complete 50 hours of community service, and have no contact with the victim after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor count of disorderly conduct filed by Middlesex Township police following the June 2022 incident.

Police also charged him with invasion of privacy for placing hidden cameras in the guest bedroom and living room while Shiloh Feeney, who was 19 at the time, was watching his house.

In June 2023, Feeney filed a lawsuit against Thiel and his wife, Crysta Ganter, seeking unspecified damages in excess of $35,000, and a jury trial.

Police did not file criminal charges against Ganter.

Feeney accepted Thiel and Ganter’s request to stay in their home to watch their dog and the home for a week while they were out of state on vacation. Ganter told Feeney to stay in the guest bedroom and told her she could have friends sleep over, according to the suit.

From June 10 to 13, Feeney changed her clothes next to the bed in the guest room twice a day and her boyfriend stayed with her June 12 and 13, according to the suit.

On the night of June 13, she discovered a “hidden spy camera” mounted on a wall under a TV and pointed at the bed, according to the suit. She unplugged the camera.

The next day, she found another camera in the living room pointed at the couch and unplugged it. Within 10 minutes of unplugging that camera, Thiel called Feeney on her cellphone. She said that was the first time he had ever contacted her and she didn’t know his phone number, according to the suit.

Feeney was naked or partially naked several times in the guest room before she found the camera, and she said she believes the camera was recording and/or transmitting videos of her, according to the suit.

Ganter sent Feeney a text message apologizing for the presence of the cameras and said the cameras were not recording. On June 14, Feeney was shaking, crying and upset about the cameras and left work early due to her emotional state, according to the suit.

Feeney said she believes Thiel set up the cameras with Ganter’s permission and approval, according to the suit.

The suit makes claims of invasion of privacy and negligent infliction of emotional distress against Thiel and Ganter, and says Feeney suffers from mental anguish, humiliation, post-traumatic stress, nightmares, insomnia and insecurity as a result of the cameras.

In addition, the suit says the cameras are similar to a camera found about a year earlier in Ganter’s sister’s home next door. That camera was also the subject of a police investigation.

In their response to the suit, Thiel and Ganter denied many of the allegations, but admitted there was a camera in the guest room and both cameras were capable of transmitting remotely to a cellphone. They denied viewing videos and said Thiel deleted the app from his phone.