MIA customs officer charged with enticing girl to engage in sex, photo shoot

Jay Weaver
·2 min read

A U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer who worked at Miami International Airport was charged Wednesday with enticing a 16-year-old girl to engage in sex and with trying to persuade her to pose for pornographic pictures, according to federal authorities.

Fabio Lopez, 61, of Weston, came to know the girl after he had befriended her mother at MIA while she was traveling abroad in late 2018, authorities said. Lopez was later introduced to the girl during a visit at the mother’s home and developed a relationship with the teen, including exchanging text messages.

Lopez had his first appearance in Fort Lauderdale federal court on Wednesday. He is scheduled for a detention hearing on March 16 and an arraignment on March 25. His defense attorney could not be immediately reached for comment.

According to a criminal affidavit, Lopez fondled the girl in his SUV and offered to pay her money so he could take sexually suggestive photographs of her. The girl told her mother about Lopez’s conduct, and the mother contacted the Pembroke Pines Police Department.

The police brought in agents with Homeland Security Investigations, who carried out an undercover operation. During a recorded call on the girl’s cellular phone, she told Lopez that “she was frightened by his touching her,” the affidavit says. Lopez asked for her forgiveness and said “it would never happen again.” He also “admitted to touching [her] vagina.”

In another exchange, an undercover agent played the role of the girl in a series of text messages with Lopez. They discussed when and how to take the sexually suggestive photographs of her, according to the affidavit. They scheduled a meeting on Tuesday in Davie, where Lopez was taken into custody.

In a videotaped interview after his arrest, Lopez told agents that “he had reserved a hotel room to take [the girl] back to,” put her “favorite foods and lingerie” in the room, and that “he intended to take photographs of [her] wearing the lingerie with the camera on [her] cellular telephone.”