An American Airlines flight attendant who was arrested for allegedly recording a 14-year-old girl in the bathroom was also arrested for allegedly doing the same to a 9-year-old girl, whose family is suing him and the airline, according to reports. It is said that they are doing so.
Estes Carter Thompson III, 36, was arrested on January 18 for allegedly recording several girls using a toilet on a plane with a hidden camera.
He was charged in September after being caught red-handed by a 14-year-old girl who noticed an iPhone taped to the toilet on a flight from Charlotte, North Carolina, to Boston. Her family filed a lawsuit against the airline.
A federal investigation revealed four previous victims, including a 9-year-old girl in Texas. Daily Mail reported.
The girl’s parents claim Thompson recorded her on a flight to Los Angeles in January 2023 to go to Disney World and a gymnastics competition, the paper said.
The FBI reportedly recovered images from his iCloud that allegedly showed the girl’s face, buttocks, and genitals.
“When the FBI showed up on our doorstep to tell us that our daughter had been photographed by an American Airlines flight attendant, we felt like we were living in a nightmare,” the family told the Daily Mail in a statement. Ta.
“Since then, our daughter has been battling fear and anxiety. We are doing everything we can to support her during this traumatic time,” they told the outlet.
“An important part of our family’s healing is making sure that the flight attendants and American Airlines are held accountable for what happened to our daughter. We hope this lawsuit will help other families experience something like this. I hope this is the first step to ensuring it doesn’t happen again.”
Thompson is charged with one count of attempted sexual exploitation of a child and one count of possession of child pornography depicting a prepubescent minor in connection with the case of the 14-year-old boy.
Prosecutors said she got up during the flight to use a nearby restroom, but the restroom was occupied, so Thompson told her the first-class restroom was open and accompanied her there.
Officials said the man told her she needed to wash her hands and that the toilet seat was broken, then briefly went in and out of the bathroom before letting her in.
According to court documents and images obtained by the newspaper, the girl noticed a red sticker on the underside of the open toilet seat lid that read “Malfunctioning food service facility” and “Removed from service.” One of her stickers had “SEAT BROKEN” handwritten in black.
She then took a photo of the sticker and her phone underneath it, after which Thompson quickly returned inside.
Her photo showed her iPhone taped haphazardly to the seat, covered except where the camera was, and the flashlight turned on. Her parents alerted other crew members and reported the incident to the captain.
The girl’s father confronted Thompson, who locked himself in the bathroom with his phone before the plane landed in Boston, where police found 11 more stickers and his phone was shipped from the factory. It is said that they discovered that it may have been restored to its original settings.
However, authorities examined Thompson’s iCloud account and found that between January and August 2023, he recorded four other underage girls, ages 7, 9, 11, and 14. It is said that a case has been discovered.
Authorities also discovered hundreds of AI-generated images of child pornography stored in Thompson’s iCloud account, officials said.
The 14-year-old’s family sued American Airlines in December, alleging that the airline did not immediately confiscate Thompson’s cell phone, potentially allowing Thompson to “destroy evidence” after flight attendants were notified. .
“He said, ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I have nothing to do with this,” the complaint states.
According to federal sentencing guidelines, Thompson could face up to 50 years in prison, a lifetime of supervised release, and a fine of up to $250,000.
The airline said Mr. Thompson was discharged from the service shortly after the September incident and has not worked since.
It was not immediately clear whether Thompson has an attorney representing him. The Post reached out to American Airlines about the lawsuit.
The company said in an earlier statement that it “takes these allegations very seriously.”
“These do not reflect our airline or our core mission of caring for people,” the airline told the Post in a statement. “Nothing is more important than the safety and security of our customers and teams, so we have fully cooperated with law enforcement in their investigation.”
