‘PERV’ KEPT ON JOB

‘Victim’ sues A’zon

Amazon kept an “active child predator” on its payroll as a delivery driver years after he was accused of offering a young girl $50 to perform a sex act on her, according to a lawsuit against the e-commerce giant.

A Massachusetts woman and her daughter are suing the Seattle-based company for negligence after the girl was “sexually accosted” by driver Heliab Leal De-Melo in the fall of 2019, it was alleged in court papers filed in federal court in late December.

The alleged incident took place two years after DeMelo was charged with sexually accosting a different minor and offering her money for permission to perform a sexual act on her, according to court papers.

The plaintiffs in the lawsuit say Amazon was negligent in not properly vetting De-Melo and that the company should have been aware of the 2017 incident. The Post obtained a copy of the police report from 2017 when Framingham police charged De-Melo.

In the most recent alleged incident, De-Melo, 37, of South Grafton, Mass., approached the girl, age 11 at the time, while she was walking her dog and subjected her to “sexually annoying and accosting conduct,” according to court documents.

Amazon has denied the allegations that the company was “negligent in hiring and retaining” De-Melo and that the e-commerce giant “knew, or should have known, of [his] proclivity for the conduct directed toward minors.”

‘Negligence’

The lawsuit alleges Amazon was negligent by keeping De-Melo employed even though a local Massachusetts news outlet, WickedLocal.com, reported in 2017 that another young girl claimed De-Melo offered to pay for permission to perform a sex act on her and that he was given a summons by police.

De-Melo “denied having said anything involved sexual acts for money,” according to the police report cited by the news site.

However, he was charged with accosting and annoying a person of the opposite sex and offering money to a minor for sexual conduct.

De-Melo continued working as an Amazon driver after the 2017 incident.

Amazon didn’t respond to a request for comment.

In court papers, Amazon states it is “without knowledge as to the facts alleged” in the plaintiff ’s lawsuit.