A forty-year-old who was supposed to sell dreams aboard a spooky Disney cruise was instead charged with possession of child pornography on Monday, following in the footsteps of two ex-colleagues arrested in similar circumstances this year.
“Consistent with our zero-tolerance policy for this type of alleged behavior, this individual is no longer with the company,” a Disney Cruise Line spokesperson said Tuesday, according to Miami television station Local 10News.
On Monday, US federal border control agents reportedly stormed the enchanting family cruise ship Disney Dream to arrest one of its employees, Filipino Tirso Neri, 44, at the port of Fort Lauderdale-Port Everglades in Florida, the “New York Post” reported Wednesday.
The police then carried out a search of the employee’s cabin as well as his personal property, which allowed them to get their hands on two cell phones, according to the complaint filed in the Southern District of Florida.
“Numerous sexually explicit photographs and videos of young children whose ages could not be determined with certainty” were discovered, reported the American media.
Among the evidence, authorities reportedly noted a complete file containing images and videos of a 17-year-old victim – including a photo of her passport confirming her age – as well as several other videos, including one titled “delicious (girl) 9 years old.
For his part, the accused would have defended himself by indicating that he would have downloaded the files from discussion groups on Telegram and Messenger without viewing them: a version which would have been denied after a forensic investigation of his cell phone showing that he would indeed have viewed the images.
The man would have been formally accused of transporting and possessing child pornography, according to the American media.
This would be the third employee of the Disney Cruise Line, assigned to the Disney Dream ship, to face this type of accusation since the beginning of the year, while two former colleagues, Alvin Gonzales, 49, and Amiel Trazo, 28, was reportedly arrested in January for possession of child pornography.
