39-year-old Jackie Jaja, who has been on the sex offenders register since 2016, was arrested in France after attempting to organize a fake ceremony with a Ukrainian child at Disneyland Paris. He has been charged with fraud, breach of trust, money laundering and theft of personal data. Meanwhile, British police continue to search for him for violating the terms of supervision. This is reported by UNN with reference to the BBC.
Details
According to media reports, Jaja has been charged with "fraud, breach of trust, money laundering and theft of personal data", while British police are looking for him for "violating the terms of the sex offenders register".
After the hearing, the court decided to take him into custody. According to the French prosecutor, the man tried to hide his identity: he allegedly "had professional makeup applied, which made his face look completely different from his own".
Jaja's name has been on the sex offenders register since 2016, when he was convicted of having relationships with minors. He spent some time in prison, and after his release he was subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order, which imposes strict restrictions on his freedom.
Despite this, Jaja continued to organize productions involving children and young people. According to the BBC, some of these videos were published on a YouTube channel designed as an official performer page. The account has garnered over six million views and over 12 million subscribers.
Another channel featured a video containing secretly filmed footage of one of the 15-year-old victims for whom Jaja was convicted. Her family told the BBC that Jaja had "ruined" her life and called it "unacceptable that the video remained publicly available for four years". Last September, the BBC informed Google about this. The company then replied that it "takes user safety seriously", but did not explain how Jaja's little-known account gained millions of subscribers and why the videos were not removed earlier.
Documents collected by the BBC show that the cost of renting locations and hiring actors amounted to hundreds of thousands of pounds. The rent of the area in front of the Odeon cinema in Leicester Square in London, where Hollywood film premieres are often held, alone cost tens of thousands of pounds.
French TV channel BFMTV reported that the staging of a fake wedding at Disneyland Paris could have cost the organizers more than 130,000 euros. It is still unclear how these large-scale events were financed.
In a comment to the BBC, the Metropolitan Police of Great Britain stated that a 39-year-old man is wanted for violating the Sexual Harm Prevention Order and non-compliance with the requirements of the sex offenders register.
We are aware that the man has been arrested in France for other matters, and officers are in contact with the French authorities
Addition
The prosecutor noted that the Ukrainian girl arrived in France two days before the event at Disneyland. According to official data, she was not subjected to physical or sexual violence, and she was not "forced to play the role" of the bride.
The statement also stated that Disneyland Paris was "deceived" and that Jaja used a fake Latvian ID to rent the venue.