A Bay Area teacher has been sentenced to prison after officials discovered a decades-long history of sexual acts against minors, including inappropriate Zoom calls with children.
Joseph Brian Houg, 51, was sentenced to 35 years in prison by Santa Clara Superior Court. Previous to his arrest, Houg worked as a teacher at Blossom Elementary in Los Gatos for 20 years. He was also the director of the Los Gatos Youth Theater.
In May of 2020, a child came forward to the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office reporting that Houg had made him feel uncomfortable during a private Zoom session. The 13-year-old boy told officers that Houg had repeatedly pressured him into showing Houg his abdominal muscles, despite multiple attempts to redirect the conversation.
A second 13-year-old victim reported that Houg had asked to see a pair of the boy’s underwear while speaking via Zoom. A third victim then came forward and told detectives that Houg had touched him inappropriately in 2008 when he was in 5th grade.
Officers executed a search warrant of Houg's residence and seized numerous electronic storage devices, revealing "behavior indicative of a pedophile," the department stated. Houg had multiple records of Zoom meetings of his class performing yoga exercises, videos of young boys changing clothes and videos and images of children in their underwear.
Houg was arrested in September of 2020 for felony lewd and lascivious acts with a minor as well as multiple counts of molesting and annoying a minor. He was held on a $100,000 bail.
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