A member of British Airways cabin crew has been fined a total of £800 ($1,050) and placed on a sex offender’s register after being found guilty of filming a man urinate in a toilet at Heathrow International Airport (LHR) in October 2019. The flight attendant has since been sacked by British Airways after details of his voyeurism became clear.
Andrea Cesqui, 36, of Malaga in Spain pleaded guilty to one charge of voyeurism at Uxbridge Magistrates Court earlier this week. Cesqui was tracked down by his own colleagues who recognised him from CCTV images and called the police on him the court was told.
The incident started when the victim went to urinate in a toilet cubicle in the airside area of Heathrow’s Terminal 5 on October 21, 2019. The victim, however, soon realised something was amiss.
“He noticed that somebody had placed a mobile phone over the top of the cubicle doors. He could see the top of the phone with its rear side camera lens exposed. He looked into the lens and the person holding the phone immediately pulled the phone down,” prosecutor Beata Murphy told the court in comments reported by My London.
When the victim left the cubicle, he says he saw Cesqui leave the cubicle next to his. The victim then confronted Cesqui who was “extremely nervous and agitated”, demanding to see the photos on his phone.
Cesqui showed an album of images of male genitalia but refused to show the most recent photos on his phone according to the victim.
He went to get a security guard but by the time he found one, Cesqui had disappeared. And while Cesqui was wearing a hoodie and appeared to be a passenger, the victim noticed he was also wearing a British Airways uniform underneath.
CCTV images were collected and then shared with a select few BA employees. Around a month later, on November 19, an employee who had seen the images noticed Cesqui in a staff canteen and called the police.
Cesqui’s lawyer said it was a “stupid” and “one-off” offence. “As a result of this foolish act on his behalf he has lost his job working for British Airways as cabin crew,” his lawyer told the court.
The judge said the offence was not so serious as to justify a prison sentence, instead issuing Cesqui with a £650 fine, along with requiring him to a £65 victim surcharge and £85 towards court costs. Cesqui will also be placed on a sex offenders register for five years.
