Former massage therapist Javarous Lashay McNealy, age 34, was arrested on federal charges after agents found child sexual abuse materials (CSAM) on his cellphone when he disembarked the Carnival Conquest at PortMiami on Monday, April 6, 2026, according to a Local 10 News report.

Federal authorities said they opened McNealy’s Telegram application on his phone and found “at least 50” illicit videos, including those that show “prepubescent” boys and girls being raped and abused by adults.

Investigators said “multiple Telegram conversations” on his phone showed that he was sending the videos to other users.

According to Local 10 News, McNealy shared illicit videos with “like-minded users” on the social media platform X. McNealy confessed that he “would buy, trade and download” CSAM.

McNealy previously lost his Florida massage therapist license in 2021 after regulators found that he engaged in sexual misconduct. 

Local 10 reported that McNealy pleaded no contest to misdemeanor battery in a Charlotte County case in which he was originally arrested for sexual battery. The case investigators said he orally sexually assaulted a male client while working at a massage shop in Port Charlotte in 2018.

McNealy appeared in Miami federal court on Tuesday and was ordered held pending a pre-trial detention hearing scheduled for Friday.

Javarous McNealy (Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office via Local 10 News)

In a similar case, last month we reported on a Royal Caribbean passenger arrested on Freedom of the Seas for possession of CSAM, another case in which illegal videos were discovered after a cruise returned to a U.S. port.

The issue arises in McNealy’s case why Carnival didn’t locate his criminal record for sexual battery in 2018 prior to the cruise and block him from boarding. Carnival is one of the cruise lines which claims that it checks public records and sexual offender databases and prohibits offenders from boarding its cruise ships. Carnival also advertises that it partners with INTERPOL for “enhanced security screening” prior to cruises.

We have reported on this kind of issue before. Read: Do Cruise Lines Permit Registered Sexual Offenders to Cruise?

Don’t expect the U.S. government or port authorities (at either the state or national levels) to perform background checks and prevent sexual offenders or passengers with criminal records from cruising.  Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection may arrest sexual predators who have outstanding warrants but they usually do so only after the cruise ship returns to port.

Possession and transportation of CSAM is a crime committed by both cruise passengers and crew members. We have previously reported that nearly 200 crew members have been accused of possessing CSAM, mostly videos, in the past two years. Over 20 ship employees have been arrested and prosecuted, mostly last year, with around 170 deported. Another two dozen cruise passengers have also been caught with possession of CSAM.

Have a comment or question? Please leave one below or join the discussion on our Facebook page.