Convicted sex offender pleads not guilty in peeping case

By Matt Pordum

Friday, April 29, 2005 | 9:15 a.m.

A 44-year-old convicted sex offender accused of peeping in the window of a woman's Green Valley apartment and exposing himself pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges related to the incident.

Sammie Combs is scheduled to stand trial on one count each of open and gross lewdness and attempted burglary on Aug. 22 before District Judge Jackie Glass.

Police had Combs under surveillance because he was suspected of trying to break into a woman's apartment at the same place, the Invitational complex on Green Valley Parkway near Wigwam Parkway, in December.

As officers watched through binoculars in February, Combs allegedly looked into a woman's apartment window and unzipped his pants, according to the police report.

When police approached him, Combs told them he was the manager of a used car dealership and was in the area looking for repossessed cars, but he had no documentation with him that would support that claim, police said.

Combs is a registered Tier 1 sex offender with arrests for open and gross lewdness in 1985, prowling in 1989, and stalking and failing to register his new address with police in 1994.

He is currently out of custody on $90,000 bail.