American Airlines flight attendant charged with videoing girls in airplane lavatories; is undone by one of the girls and the way his phone sent images to the cloud, FBI says

The FBI today arrested an American Airlines flight attendant it says videoed several girls - the youngest just 7 - in lavatories on flights across the country and used an artificial-intelligence program to generate more graphic child-porn images.

Estes Carter Thompson III, 37, of Charlotte, NC, was arrested in Lynchburg, VA on charges of attempted sexual exploitation of children and possession of child pornography depicting a prepubescent minor for an incident involving a 14-year-old girl on a flight on Sept. 2, the US Attorney's office in Boston reports. He will be transported to Boston for arraignment in federal court because the flight from Charlotte was bound for and landed in Boston.

According to an affidavit by an FBI agent on the case, investigators found video in Thompson's iCloud account that showed that girl and three others, aged 7, 9 and 11, in various stages of undress while they used the lavatory, unaware they were being recorded, between January and August of last year.

The Sept. 2 flight proved Thompson's undoing because the 14-year-old, flying to Boston with her family, "had discovered a concealed recording device (iPhone) in the first-class lavatory after she had partially undressed and used the toilet."

The girl noticed Thompson's iPhone, its camera running and its light on, underneath some warning labels Thompson had first placed on the toilet back. She snapped the camera with her own phone and reported the incident to her parents and other flight attendants, even as Thompson was resetting his phone to its original factory settings. But while that erased the images on the phone itself, the affidavit states, it did not delete the copies of the images that Thompson's phone had uploaded to Apple's iCloud - which the FBI was able to obtain with a search warrant, along with images of other girls, on flights across the country.

His account also contained "hundreds of images of child pornography, which appear to have been created through an artificial intelligence web site" as well as examples of the text he fed into the site to generate some of the images.

The affidavit details Thompson's downfall on the Sept. 2 flight:

Approximately midway through the flight, Minor A got up to use the main cabin lavatory nearest to where the family was seated. This lavatory was located in the approximate middle of the main cabin, behind where the family was seated. When Minor A arrived at the lavatory it was occupied. She had been waiting a short time when a male flight attendant, later identified as THOMPSON, approached Minor A and told her that the first-class lavatory was unoccupied and that she could use it. THOMPSON escorted Minor A as she went forward on the aircraft toward the first-class lavatory. THOMPSON told Minor A that before she entered, he had to wash his hands. In addition, THOMPSON told Minor A that the lavatory’s toilet seat was broken and that it would be fixed when flight 1441 returned to Charlotte. THOMPSON then entered the lavatory for a period of time. Minor A felt that the amount of time THOMPSON was in the lavatory was a little long for simply washing his hands. After THOMPSON exited the lavatory Minor A entered.

When she entered the lavatory, Minor A observed red stickers on the underside of the toilet seat lid, which was in the open position. The stickers looked official. Minor A assumed, based on THOMPSON’s statements to her, that the stickers were related to the toilet seat being broken and that the toilet was still in working order. Not thinking anything was wrong, Minor A then proceeded to partially undress, removing or pulling down her shorts and underwear, in order to utilize the toilet.

When Minor A was done, she stood up, dressed, and turned to flush the toilet. When she turned, Minor A then noticed that an iPhone was actually protruding out from underneath the red stickers. The flash of the iPhone was now constantly illuminated. This caused Minor A to notice the iPhone protruding out, whereas she had not noticed it prior to undressing and using the toilet. Minor A looked closely at the portion of the iPhone not covered by the stickers. She could see that the iPhone or its case was dark in color and textured. Minor A also noticed a white dot on the phone or case near the illuminated flash. Minor A immediately knew this was wrong and used her phone to take a picture of the red stickers and concealed iPhone in order to show it and report what happened to her parents. d. Minor A exited the lavatory. Minor A observed that THOMPSON thenimmediately entered the lavatory. Minor A returned to her seat. She immediately reported what had happened and showed the picture she had taken of the stickers and concealed iPhone to her mother.

That started what became a series of verbal confrontations between Thompson and the girl's parents and other flight attendants, during which Thompson started fiddling with his phone and at one point locked himself in the same lavatory for five minutes shortly before the plane landed.

At Logan, Massachusetts state troopers boarded the plane and questioned Thompson both while he was still on board and then in the jetway. They found no images or text messages on the phone after he voluntarily handed it over, but did note it was still connected to an iCloud account, the affidavit states, adding they then took him, his phone and his suitcase to their airport barracks, where he declined to talk to FBI agents without a lawyer present. He was allowed to leave, but the troopers handed his phone and suitcase over to the FBI, which launched an investigation that included obtaining a search warrant on Sept. 19 for both the phone and the iCloud account.

Innocent, etc.