Jacky Jhaj
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Jaskarn "Jacky" Jhaj (born October 1985)[1] is a British convicted sex offender who has conducted a number of public stunts, mostly involving children, which have received high-profile media coverage due to their bizarre nature.
In June 2025, Jhaj was the subject of controversy when he was arrested at the Disneyland Paris resort during a mock "wedding" to a 9-year-old girl.
Biography
[edit]2016 conviction and subsequent incidents
[edit]He was convicted in 2016 of four counts of sexual activity with two 15-year-old girls having pretended to be a film producer.[2] Jhaj had driven near schools in Hounslow in west London claiming to be a Hollywood film producer and offering alcohol.[2] He was sentenced to four years in prison.[3] He is on the sex offenders register.[3]
In 2023 Jhaj staged a mock film premiere in Leicester Square involving girls who were hired to pose as fans.[3] The children had been instructed to "cry, far-reach and faint" for Jhaj by the casting agency that had hired them.[2]
Jhaj was arrested in June 2024 after being witnessed talking to young girls in east London outside a dance school.[2] He also filmed them and took photos without the consent of their parents.[2]
2024 Silvertown fire
[edit]On 31 August 2024 in what Jhaj described as 'Project Dover' he started a large fire in an explosion "using gunpowder and a detonation cord" in a yard on Dock Road in Silvertown, Greenwich. A fake BBC News lorry and police cars were set on fire and destroyed while Jhaj posed naked for cameras.[4] He had initially worn prosthetics to disguise his identity.[4][5] The Evening Standard reported that Jhaj had " ... sat at a typewriter surrounded by hundreds of newspapers on the floor before flicking cigarettes at a police car, a police van and a BBC World News branded lorry which all exploded into a huge blaze".[3] 25 firefighters were involved in suppressing the fire.[3] No one was injured in the incident.[3]
2025 Disneyland mock wedding
[edit]In June 2025 he held a mock wedding ceremony with a nine-year-old Ukrainian girl at Disneyland Paris.[6] Prosthetics were again used to disguise his identity.[2] The ceremony involved 100 extras who were paid €200 after responding to an advertisement posted online that described a "prestige wedding rehearsal" which required "absolute confidentiality".[2] A 55-year-old Latvian man was paid €12,000 to pretend to be the father of the bride but told the park security who informed the police after discovering that the bride was a child.[2] The girl had arrived in France with her mother two days before the incident. Both the girl and her mother are Ukrainian citizens.[2]
He was subsequently held by French authorities and charged with fraud, identity theft and money laundering.[4][2] The Parisian prosecutors said that the girl involved had not "a victim of either physical or sexual violence and had not been forced to play the role of a bride" and that a stolen Latvian form of identification had been used by the organiser.[4] The management Disneyland said that the event was "immediately cancelled by our teams after major irregularities were identified" and that they were " ... cooperating fully with the authorities in their investigation, and have filed a complaint with the relevant authorities".[2]
References
[edit]- ^ "Companies House". Retrieved 2 July 2025.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Aurelien Breeden and Lizzie Dearden (2 September 2024). "British Man Is Charged Over Attempted Mock Wedding With 9-Year-Old at Disneyland Paris". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 27 June 2025. Retrieved 29 June 2025.
- ^ a b c d e f "Convicted paedophile 'behind huge film set explosion' near London's O2 Arena". The Evening Standard. 2 September 2024. Retrieved 29 June 2025.
- ^ a b c d Titheradge, Noel (29 June 2025). "The mystery of the paedophile who hired out Disneyland". BBC News. Retrieved 29 June 2025.
- ^ "Film set explosion causes blaze opposite O2 arena". BBC News. 31 August 2024. Retrieved 29 June 2025.
- ^ "British man charged over mock Disneyland wedding to child had been investigated by BBC". BBC News. 25 June 2025. Retrieved 29 June 2025.