The 82-year-old estranged father of Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, was arrested Friday morning in Florida on charges of possessing child pornography in storage units in California, authorities said.
Thomas Markle Sr. was arrested outside Tampa, according to people who were not authorized to publicly discuss the investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
Federal agents searched two storage units in the Los Angeles area and “seized approximately 78 items, including slides, film negatives and books” containing alleged images of child sexual abuse, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said.
The Daily Mail, a British tabloid, was the first to report Markle’s arrest.
Markle, who has rented the units since 2008, is accused of possessing child sexual abuse images, Essayli said. His arrest followed reports in The Sun, another British tabloid, that Meghan’s half-brother found a collection of such images while clearing out their father’s house in the Philippines.
This discovery abroad provided information on American storage units. Some images appear to depict Markle with children, according to an FBI affidavit filed in court.
Markle was scheduled to make his first court appearance Friday afternoon in Tampa, Florida. It was not immediately clear whether he has an attorney who can respond to the allegations.
“These allegations are extremely serious and we will pursue Mr. Markle to the fullest extent of federal law,” Essayli said.
Meghan, an American citizen who starred in the American television series “Suits”, married Prince Harry at Windsor Castle in 2018. They have two children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet.
She recently said she was “deeply distressed” by allegations that a collection of child sexual abuse images had been found in her father’s former home. She also revealed that a letter containing “disturbing allegations” about her was sent to London police in 2018.
“It contained disturbing and disturbing allegations against my father and I was assured that these allegations were being investigated,” Meghan said of the letter. “I hope that we can now understand that, despite the distortion of some media publications over the years, any distance from my father and my choice not to allow him to have contact with our children was for one reason only: to protect them.”
There was no immediate comment from Meghan’s rep on Friday.
Meghan’s father, a retired lighting and photography director, was not present marriagewhich sparked widespread coverage in the British media about Meghan’s estrangement from her father.
Thomas Markle Sr. was living in the Philippines earlier this year when he suffered a stroke and had his left leg amputated. This forced him to return to the United States
The Sun reported that Thomas Markle Jr. recently found “hundreds, maybe thousands” of child sexual abuse images in boxes in his father’s former home in Cebu City, Philippines. Markle Jr. told The Sun that he reported the images to Philippine police and contacted the FBI.
“I supported him, cared for him and helped him for years – but that stops now,” said Markle Jr. “I will never speak to my father again unless I am called to testify against him.”
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