PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — The Port St. Lucie Police Department arrested a Daytona Beach man accused of impersonating a hotel security guard.
The man, identified as 34-year-old Johnny Alonzo Leonard, is accused of posing as hotel security at WoodSpring Suites, located at 11600 SW Village Parkway.
Police say that around 3:30 p.m. on Jan. 10, the two victims, a 17-year-old male and 17-year-old female, were parked in the back lot of the hotel and were engaged in "intimate activities" in the back of the female victim's car.
The suspect approached the car and stated that he was hotel security, and that police has been called. He did not have any identification that showed he was a security guard. He asked the victims for their IDs, and the male gave the suspect his driver's license.
The suspect then asked the male to exit the car and began to search him. The male victim says the suspect slipped his hands under his underwear and grabbed his genitals during the search.
The suspect told the female to leave, and told the male to come with him into the hotel, where he took the victim's phone. He looked through the victim's phone and found sexual videos, which he texted to himself.
After saying he would take the victim to a "public place" to meet police, the suspect drove the victim to a bus station on SW Gatlin Boulevard, where the victim exited the car and ran to a nearby Home Depot. He called the female victim and police. GPS data and surveillance video helped detectives corroborate the victim's story.
Using the number the suspect texted the victim's personal videos to, detectives from the Major Crimes Unit were able to identify and contact Leonard. He was interviewed at the Port St. Lucie Police Department, and detectives say at some point after the interview, Leonard was able to remove his handcuffs and leave the interview room. He was quickly taken back into custody.
Sgt. Dominick Mesiti tells WPTV's Tyler Hatfield that detectives "identified and had the suspect in custody within 12 hours after the incident."
Mesiti added that there are ways to confirm if someone is actually a security guard.
“They're going to be in some sort of uniform, or at least some kind of polo shirt that says security or something like that," he said. "They have, if they are licensed, they should have some sort of security identification that's issued by the state of Florida.”
Leonard faces two counts of false imprisonment, robbery with no weapon, larceny, transmission of child pornography, impersonating a security guard while committing a felony, unlawful use of a two-way communication device and attempted escape. He is being held at St. Lucie County Jail on a $185,000 bond.
