INFO LE PARISIEN. This Saturday, the theme park was due to host a wedding. But when the Ukrainian bride-to-be arrived, Disneyland staff discovered that she was just a child. Although the public prosecutor’s office says it was staged, four people have been arrested.
The staff at the theme park were stunned and reacted swiftly. On Saturday 21 June, Disneyland Paris, located in Marne-la-Vallée (Seine-et-Marne), was to be taken over by a foreigner to host his “wedding”.
But when the bride arrived, the Disney teams realised that she was a child. The little girl was only 9 years old. As a result, the guests – around a hundred of them – did not enter the theme park and the privatisation could not take place. Although the public prosecutor’s office suggested on Saturday evening that the incident might have been staged, four people were nevertheless taken into custody.
A complaint lodged by Disney
The scene took place at dawn. And with good reason: these private events are organised outside public opening hours. Disneyland Paris confirms that everything was immediately cancelled by the teams on site.
After major irregularities had been identified,” stress those in charge, without going into detail. The forces of law and order were quickly alerted and intervened on site as quickly as possible. We are cooperating fully with the authorities in their investigation, and have also lodged a complaint with the relevant authorities”.
On Saturday evening, the Meaux public prosecutor’s office confirmed that four people had been arrested and questioned. They include the groom, presumed to be British and aged 22, as well as the child’s mother, a 41-year-old Ukrainian, and two Latvian nationals, aged 55 and 24.
The groom says it was “staged”
“Investigations, including a medical examination of the minor, who is Ukrainian, revealed that she had not been subjected to any violence or coercion and that the event had been staged, with the guests themselves acting as extras”, stated the Meaux public prosecutor’s office in a press release.
“So it wasn’t a wedding, but a staged wedding filmed with around a hundred extras, and they privatised Disneyland Paris pretending it was a real wedding”, the magistrate went on to explain to AFP.
Fake wedding but real police custody
The police custody of the alleged British man and a Latvian national has been extended on charges of fraud and money laundering.
For the time being, the circumstances of this event remain rather unclear. According to a police source, the man presenting himself as the groom said that it was a film shoot and that he was the director of a production company. On the spot, the people who witnessed the arrival of the groom and the little girl, including Disney staff, never imagined that they were witnessing a staged event.
At no point was there any talk of filming,” said a witness at the theme park on Saturday morning. We all thought we were going to see a wedding… Everyone was stunned, no one was expecting it. Disneyland did everything very well,” he continues. They cancelled everything as soon as they realised that the bride was a child. We were stunned to see that.
