Disney Cruise employees were among 28 people arrested in a Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) operation.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) boarded five cruise ships, including a Disney cruise docked in San Diego, between April 23 and 25 as part of the operation.

“We have a zero-tolerance policy for this type of behavior and fully cooperated with law enforcement. While the majority of these individuals were not from our cruise line, those who were are no longer with the company,” a Disney spokesperson said, according to the New York Post.

 

More from the New York Post:

It’s unclear which other ships the additional crew members may have worked on outside of Disney.

ADVERTISEMENT

Passengers aboard a Disney cruise ship docking in San Diego were stunned as they documented multiple employees getting arrested last month.

Vacationers watched as immigration officials cuffed several employees on the Disney Magic ship while it was being unloaded. Passenger Dharmi Mehta took a video of the moment, saying one of those detained was her server.

Prior to the news about what the arrests were allegedly for, several immigration rights groups were up in arms about the Disney arrests, and also claimed four “seafarers” were arrested on the Holland America MV Zandaam cruise ship.

The port said local police were not involved in the arrest.

“The Port of San Diego Harbor Police Department did not have any involvement in the reported enforcement actions on April 23 or April 25 at the B Street Cruise Terminal,” a spokesperson for the port told NBC San Diego.

“After boarding the vessels and interviewing 26 suspected crew members from the Philippines, one suspected crew member from Portugal, and one from Indonesia, officers confirmed all subjects were involved in either the receipt, possession, transportation, distribution, or viewing of CSEM or child pornography,” a CBP spokesperson said, according to the New York Post.

“CBP cancelled their visas and these criminals are being removed from our country,” the spokesperson added.

“On April 28, HSI San Diego arrested twenty-three crewmembers from multiple cruise ships at the Port of San Diego as part of Operation Tidal Wave. The arrests targeted individuals suspected of involvement with Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM), based on information received from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The arrestees were transported to Los Angeles for processing, and their visas were revoked,” ICE spokesperson Sandra Grisolia said in a statement, according to NBC 7 San Diego.

Watch below:

NBC 7 San Diego shared further:

ADVERTISEMENT

The first sighting came as Mehta was waiting to clear customs. Later, as she and her family were leaving the parking lot at the B Street Pier near the cruise terminal, she spotted several other crewmembers being loaded into a white van surrounded by federal agents.

“It was really unsettling,” said Mehta, who spoke to reporters during a news conference on the pier nearly two weeks after the incident. The most troublesome thing, she said, was that one of the crewmembers being detained was the head waiter who had served her and her family throughout the cruise. She knew the man has two daughters and was looking forward to seeing them later this month.

Mehta said the head waiter and the others who were taken into custody were still wearing their Disney-issued uniforms and didn’t have any of their belongings with them. “So that was just my big concern like how is he gonna reach out to his family? Does the family even know that he’s not getting back on the ship today?”

 

Join The Conversation. Leave a Comment.