Man Admits To Recording Patients In Bathrooms At Nassau County Sleep Center: DA

NASSAU COUNTY, NY — A Brooklyn man admitted to secretly recording patients in bathrooms at a sleep center in Manhasset between July 2023 and April 2024 when he worked there as a sleep technician, Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly announced Tuesday.

Sanjai Syamaprasad, 48, pleaded guilty to five counts of second-degree unlawful surveillance and two counts of tampering with physical evidence, Donnelly said.

"Patients who enter medical facilities expect and deserve their privacy to be protected, especially inside of sensitive locations like bathrooms," Donnelly said in a news release. "This defendant, a medical professional himself, violated the trust that patients hold in these institutions and the people who care for them with his sickening behavior. Syamaprasad shamelessly and creepily played back the videos he created of patients on his work computer — both adults and children — until he was discovered by a co-worker and terminated by Northwell, and later, tried to destroy the evidence of his crimes. Sanjai Syamaprasad wanted to hide in the shadows while he exposed patients at their most vulnerable, but it is his disgusting conduct and guilt that are laid bare for everyone to see."

Between at least July 2023 and April 2024, Syamaprasad, then an employee of the Northwell Health Sleep Disorders Center in Manhasset, placed a hidden camera made to look like a smoke detector using Velcro discs on the walls inside staff and multiple patient bathrooms within the sleep center, investigators said. He also placed a camera in a public bathroom at STARS Rehabilitation, located in the same building as the sleep center, prosecutors said.

The cameras captured recordings of approximately hundreds of people while they were using the bathrooms during this time period, authorities said.

Based on images recovered and reviewed by Nassau County District Attorney investigators, five individuals were identified on the videos, including a child, officials said.

Syamaprasad removed the camera at the end of his shift and downloaded the footage onto an SD card, the DA said.

Northwell referred the conduct to the Nassau County District Attorney’s Office in April 2024, the office stated.

On April 25, 2024, a search warrant was executed on Syamaprasad's home in Brooklyn, officials said. Multiple electronics, such as phones, an SD card reader, and three laptops were recovered, prosecutors said.

Investigators say they learned that Syamaprasad destroyed evidence, throwing the smoke detector camera and the broken-up SD card into a trash can at a local CVS pharmacy in Brooklyn. The smoke detector camera was ultimately recovered from a dumpster behind the store by a Nassau County Police Department detective, authorities said.

Syamaprasad was arrested by NCDA Detective Investigators on April 25, 2024, officials said.

Syamaprasad is due back in court on Sept. 15 and is expected to receive five years of probation, the DA said.

The Nassau County District Attorney's Office recommended Syamaprasad be sentenced to one to three years in prison consecutively for each of the seven counts he was charged with.

"The NCDA thanks the Nassau County Police Department and Northwell Health for their cooperation and assistance in this prosecution," the DA's office stated.

Syamaprasad is represented by Julie Rendelman.