South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
Some wild things happened in 2020 at the theme parks.
Guests attacking security guards. A drone flying over an empty Magic Kingdom and a Discovery Island trespasser. Even someone with a fake badge pretending to be a Drug Enforcement Administration agent.
These are some of the strange headlines that emerged in 2020 at Orlando’s theme parks.
Security and unruly guests
Several Orange County sheriff’s reports revealed some of the bizarre situations that security guards handled on the frontlines of the theme parks.
In Animal Kingdom’s DinoLand U.S.A., a man tackled a security guard and pinned him down as visitors had to intervene in October.
James Arvid, 18, put the guard in a headlock and held him down, but the guard still managed to radio for help.
The security guard’s elbows were cut up but he otherwise was unhurt. Meanwhile, Arvid was “bloody, sweating profusely, non-responsive to commands, and compulsively kicking his legs,” according to the sheriff ’s report. “It appeared James was in a state of excited delirium and unexpected strength.”
“I took LSD and tried to kill someone,” Arvid, who couldn’t remember anything else at the park, told a nurse at the hospital, according to the report.
Arvid was charged with battery on a licensed security officer, a third-degree felony. His court case is still open.
One Epcot security guard was attacked by a man who became irate when he was reminded about Disney’s mask rules in August.
“Call the police. They will have to shoot me to leave,” Enrico Toro told the guard and then hit him on the head, threatening to kill him.
Toro was arrested and charged with misdemeanor battery. His court case also is still pending.
Disney, Universal and SeaWorld all required
their guests to cover their faces and noses and tried their best to keep people separated by six feet in the queues. The vast majority of visitors appeared to obey, but occasionally, tensions bubbled up among visitors, and the law enforcement was called in.
At Universal, two women shoved and punched each other in line at Revenge of the Mummy. The fight started over how fast the socially distanced line was moving and if people were maintaining six feet of space.
One woman went as far as to cough in the other’s face during the brawl. Ultimately, Orlando police couldn’t determine who started the fight in September at Universal Studios Florida.
So what if Disney’s closed?
The world’s busiest theme park was brought to a standstill in March, closed because of the coronavirus pandemic.
A 40-year-old Minneola
man flew a drone 100 feet from the Cinderella Castle to capture that scene in May. He didn’t realize the Magic Kingdom is a designated no-fly zone, he said.
The Orange County Sheriff ’s Office caught the drone pilot standing behind trees near an apartment complex he did not live at while he flew his drone about the size of a frisbee, according to the report.
He wasn’t charged with a crime but was issued a trespass warning.
During the theme park closures because of the COVID-19 pandemic, another person took advantage of the peacefulness on Disney property: The man was caught trespassing on Discovery Island.
Richard McGuire, of Mobile, Ala., told Orange County deputies he planned to camp out for a week on the island that was once a scenic attraction where visitors could see wildlife until Disney shut it down in 1999. He was shooting footage for his YouTube channel.
Despite the posted no trespassing signs, McGuire
told authorities he didn’t know the island was off-limits to the public. He called it a tropical paradise.
In late September, McGuire pleaded no contest to trespassing and was ordered to pay $378 in fines and court costs.
Down with the ship
The Internet went wild in 2020 as two iconic boat rides at the Magic Kingdom started sinking.
It happened first in February at Jungle Cruise. A boat carrying passengers began taking in water, although everyone was safely rescued. Disney didn’t say what happened to cause the issue.
Then, months later, in August, a similar situation happened at Splash Mountain. Riders safely climbed out of a log flume before it sank.
Guns, guns, guns
An 18-year-old man wore a fake Drug Enforcement Administration badge and carried a loaded BB gun in a waistband holster strapped to his lower back as he tried to enter Disney Springs in November.
Nathaniel Smith, of Oviedo, insisted he had been recently hired into the Georgia Division of the DEA and showed a sheriff ’s deputy his gold badge reading “DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION SPECIAL AGENT.”
There were plenty of red flags.
Technically no Georgia Division exists since the agency runs from an Atlanta office.
Smith said he didn’t have his official DEA identification card with him. He also couldn’t give the deputy his DEA supervisor’s phone number.
Smith was charged with impersonating an officer, a third-degree felony, and for unlawfully displaying a badge and carrying a concealed weapon, both first-degree misdemeanors. He has pleaded not guilty, according to court records in his pending case.
Throughout 2020, law enforcement was called in as vacationers packed weapons on their trips even though Disney bans guns on its property regardless of whether someone has a concealed weapon license.
A 43-year-old South Florida man brought an AR-15 rifle and 9mm handgun as he checked into Polynesian Village Resort during Labor Day weekend. He told the sheriff ’s office he was worried about his family’s safety because the Black Lives Matter protests were happening in Central Florida.
The guns were discovered by a bellman who carried the heavy tennis bag containing the weapons to the man’s room. The employee notified his manager. The tourist wasn’t arrested.
In October, a woman hid her loaded handgun behind a planter near the Magic Kingdom’s security checkpoint.
A temperature-checker saw Marcia Temple, 27, stashing her pink purse with a gun inside.
When Temple was confronted, she tried to blame the situation on her
6-year-old son.
“I had told my son to hold it for me and stand right here,” Temple said as she went to get her brother to take the purse and gun back to the car, according to the sheriff ’s report.
The woman from Lithonia, Ga., was charged with carrying a concealed firearm. Her court case is still pending.
Another mother also made headlines for the way she brought two guns into Epcot: In her baby’s diaper bag.
Yunique Smith, 27, of Stone Mountain, Ga., left a semi-automatic 9mm handgun, a .45 caliber handgun and a plastic bag containing marijuana in her 7-monthold’s diaper bag as she tried to enter the park in July with her two children, a sheriff ’s report said.
Smith pleaded no contest to carrying a concealed weapon in September and was ordered to pay a $535 fines and court costs plus attend a gun safety class.