Jacky Jhaj was jailed for four years having been convicted of four counts of sexual activity with two 15-year-old girls after posing as a film producer in 2015 and was put on the UK’s Sex Offenders’ Register
A notorious paedophile who has staged similar stunts involving children in the UK has been unmasked as the groom who allegedly organised a mock Disneyland Paris wedding involving a nine-year-old girl.
Jacky Jahj was arrested on Saturday as a staged wedding was about to get underway outside Sleeping Beauty Castle in the French theme park. He was thought to be 22 at first, however police have now revealed he was 39 and wanted by UK forces.
Dressed as the “groom”, Jahj was seen with a child who had four-inch heels taped to her feet and accompanied by her Ukrainian mother, at the private function being held at 5am on Saturday, before the attraction was open to the public.
Jhaj was jailed for four years having been convicted of four counts of sexual activity with two 15-year-old girls after posing as a film producer in 2015 and was put on the UK’s Sex Offenders’ Register.
In April this year, Jahj was alleged to have used a renowned casting website to hire actors as young as 13 for a fake funeral. He is believed to have paid more than £10,000 for the service at the London Oratory church in south Kensington. The presiding priest dramatically halted proceedings upon realising it was being filmed, that the mourners were actors and the coffin was empty.
In August last year Jahj was reported to have been behind an explosion on a film set next to the O2 Arena in east London. Firefighters were called to an open-air yard in Dock Road, Silvertown as the blaze got out of control.
In October 2023, young children were hired as extras for a public film shoot where Jahj mingled with about 200 children and young women were playing fans outside a cinema in London’s Leicester Square, BBC reports.
French prosecutors have now confirmed he has been charged after the Disneyland stunt.
Disneyland Paris was reportedly deceived about the nature of the event, with the organiser taking the “identity of a Latvian national” and using “false documents to secure the contract for privatising the park”, BFM TV in France reported.
Guests were recruited online via adverts seeking 200 adults and 100 children aged between five and 15 to play the guests at a ‘rehearsal’ for a wedding in Disneyland.
The British man appeared before the tribunal of Meaux on Monday, after which he was charged. French prosecutors said they have been in touch with British authorities and identified the British suspect as a convicted sexual offender who is wanted in the UK.
The man has been charged with ‘fraud’, ‘breach of trust’, ‘money laundering’ and ‘identity theft’. He is also under investigation for ‘corruption of a minor’, a statement from French officials said.
French prosecutor Meaux Jean-Baptiste Bladier wrote in a statement: “(He) was reportedly convicted in the past, including for offences of a sexual nature against minors. He is, as such, listed in the British database of sexual offenders and is currently wanted nationally by the judicial authorities of his country of origin due to a breach of the requirements deriving from said order.”
Mr Bladier said in a previous statement published on Sunday that the wedding ceremony was “fictional and meant to be recorded in a private capacity”.
Preliminary findings also stated the “groom” had allegedly been “made-up professionally so that his face appeared totally different from his own”, according to the prosecutor.
The nine-year-old Ukrainian girl was accompanied by her mother, who is aged 41 and also from Ukraine. She too was arrested and placed in custody, along with a 24-year-old Latvian woman who played the role of the bride’s sister.
The entire event was due to be broadcast live on social media, according to prosecutors, with Latvian “extras” recruited online to play family and friends. Many of them had been picked up at the Eiffel Tower on Saturday morning, before being driven to Disneyland in a coach.
The prosecutor said the Brit is suspected of “recruiting, with the help of a Latvian citizen, other Latvian nationals to ensure the smooth running of the event, as well as around a hundred French extras, who were falsely presented to Disneyland Paris as wedding guests”.
The Ukrainian child, who arrived in France two days before the event, suffered “no violence, either physical or sexual” and “was not forced to play the role” of bride, the prosecutor said.
A Met Police spokeswoman told the Mirror: “A 39-year-old man is wanted by the Met Police for breaching a Sexual Harm Prevention Order and a breach of a Sex Offenders’ Register notification requirement.
“We are aware the man has been arrested in France for other matters and officers are in contact with the French authorities.”
