Important Facts
Essential Information
- Estes Carter Thompson III, previously employed as a flight attendant by American Airlines, has been sentenced to 18.5 years of incarceration and an additional five years under supervised release.
- Thompson faced allegations of installing his phone on the lid of an airplane toilet to secretly record young girls.
- He faced legal charges including one count of attempted sexual exploitation of children and one count of possession of child pornography featuring a prepubescent minor.
A former flight attendant, accused of mounting his phone on the toilet lid of an airplane to record young girls, has been sentenced to 18.5 years in prison, which will be followed by a five-year period of supervised release.
Estes Carter Thompson III, who formerly worked for American Airlines, was arrested and charged in 2024 with one count of attempted sexual exploitation of children and one count of possession of child pornography depicting a prepubescent minor. He was taken into custody in Lynchburg, Va., in January 2024, pleaded guilty to the charges in March, and received his sentence in Boston on Wednesday, July 23.
The police have reported that he had videos of a 14-year-old girl and four other young girls, aged 7, 9, 11, and 14, which were recorded over a span of nine months, as reported by The Associated Press. Additionally, AI-generated images of child sexual abuse and over 50 images of a 9-year-old girl who was traveling alone were found on his iCloud account, as per Boston.com.
Thompson’s method, which involved hiding his iPhone under a misleading sticker that read “seat broken” inside the airplane’s bathroom, was uncovered by a 14-year-old girl on a flight to Boston on September 2, 2023. She took a photo of the setup and showed it to her father, who then confronted Thompson.
During a court session, U.S. District Court Judge Julia Kobick in Boston condemned his actions as “appalling” and remarked that the child victims had lost their “innocence” due to his deeds. Thompson offered an apology in court, admitting his actions were “selfish, perverse, and wrong.”
Related News
Thompson, 37, residing in Charlotte, N.C., was arrested in 2024 after a 14-year-old girl discovered his secret recording device in the bathroom. “We take these allegations very seriously. They do not reflect our airline or our core mission of caring for people,” stated the airline in a response provided by NBC News at the time of his arrest.
Thompson is set to serve his sentence at FMC Butner in North Carolina and plans to participate in sex offender-specific treatment, according to reports.
American Airlines is still involved in a civil lawsuit in Texas, initiated by the family of one of Thompson’s victims. Paul Llewellyn, from the law firm Lewis & Llewellyn which is representing the child’s family, expressed to Boston.com, “We are pleased that the perpetrator has been sentenced to a lengthy prison term so that he can no longer prey on young girls.”
Llewellyn further added, “But no family should ever have to endure what these families have gone through.”
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