A cruise ship crew member who planted a hidden camera to watch a young girl undress in her cabin may have spied on more than 900 passengers, a class action lawsuit claims.

The attorneys who filed the civil lawsuit in federal court in Miami last October want each of those people to be able to hold the company accountable and receive damages. But Royal Caribbean, the world’s second-largest cruise ship company, backed down.

RCL attempted to dismiss the suit, saying that any passenger with a complaint of emotional or mental trauma that did not involve physical contact or physical injury, such as video voyeurism, should be subject to individual arbitration. The company says this is because passengers agree to this when purchasing their cruise ship tickets and signing the required contract.

The next step in the legal saga comes at the end of this month in a federal courthouse in Fort Lauderdale.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Detra Shaw Wilder has scheduled a hearing for 11 a.m. on October 27 to begin considering the crucial proposition to Royal Caribbean’s defense: whether the company can force guests to resort to arbitration rather than file a lawsuit. Both sides can make oral arguments, and Shaw Wilder will consider their arguments and potential ruling within several weeks.

The cruise company, which is based near PortMiami, has said the court is not the appropriate place for victims’ claims, and is pushing for arbitration.

The class action civil lawsuit was filed on October 15, 2024, in Miami federal court against Royal Caribbean Cruises and Arvin Mirasol, a former Royal Caribbean room attendant. The plaintiff, referred to as Jane Doe in the complaint and represented by the Miami firm of Lipcon, Margolis & Winkleman, was a passenger on board the Symphony of the Seas on or about February 25, 2024.

Mirasol, a room attendant, regularly cleaned passengers’ rooms, restocked towels and changed sheets on Royal Caribbean’s Symphony of the Seas, a ship carrying 5,518 passengers and 2,200 crew members. But that’s not all he did, according to court filings and a criminal complaint filed by the Broward County Sheriff’s Office.

Searching his electronic devices, including a USB device, law enforcement officers found “several videos of naked females in their bathrooms.” They said one of the girls appeared to be 10 years old. He planted small secret cameras in the passenger rooms.

In a separate criminal case brought by the US Department of Justice, on August 28, 2024, US District Judge Melissa Damian imposed the maximum possible sentence on Mirasol, a 34-year-old Filipino national who had pleaded guilty a few months earlier. He was sentenced in Fort Lauderdale federal court to 30 years in prison for producing child pornography.

The class action civil lawsuit initially claimed there may be as many as 960 passenger victims. The complaint defines the class as passengers aboard Symphony of the Seas between December 1, 2023 and February 26, 2024, who stayed in cabins serviced by Mirasol. This was the period when Royal Caribbean used Mirasol on Symphony of the Seas.

The civil suit alleges invasion of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress through video voyeurism and sexual assault committed by Mirasol and liability of Royal Caribbean. The lawsuit also accuses Royal Caribbean of not adequately training and supervising workers on board the ship and failing to “implement and/or enforce an adequate safety management system.”

Because of the sexual nature of the crimes and the ages of the victims, the law firms and the Miami Herald did not identify the passengers.

Royal Caribbean responded

The cruise company has fought off lawsuits this year, claiming it was not at fault. RCL says passengers need to have their complaints dealt with through arbitration because they automatically agreed to this when purchasing their cruise tickets and signing the required passenger contract.

“However, Plaintiffs’ claims that they suffered mental and emotional injuries must be resolved by arbitration, not in this court,” attorneys representing Royal Caribbean wrote in a court filing dated March 26, 2025. “Plaintiffs agreed in the digitally signed ticket contract that all claims for mental or emotional injury must be resolved through arbitration.”

Arbitration is a confidential process often preferred by companies.

In one document, the lawyers state that the passenger contract refers to the arbitration clause “on its first page in capital letters and in bold.”

This clause warns guests of “substantial limitations… including time and forum limitations, applicable law, (and) arbitration.” The cruise line also claims that the Federal Arbitration Act and subsequent court cases support its argument. Cozen O’Connor represents RCL.

What is not in dispute and what RCL recognizes is the exception to the demand for arbitration if a guest sustains physical injury. After that, guests can go to court and try to prove the cruise company’s liability. That’s usually difficult, but in September a Miami woman won a different case against her Carnival Company.

But in the Royal Caribbean case, “Plaintiffs allege that their emotional distress resulted from the discovery of Mirasol’s secret actions, and not from any physical injury inflicted on them by Mirasol,” the company’s lawyers wrote.

“None of the plaintiffs have alleged that Mirasol harmed them through physical contact. Instead, their complaints state that they were not aware of Mirasol’s actions while he was performing them,” according to the court filing.

Most of the plaintiffs did not learn of Mirasol’s secret recordings, hidden cameras and other acts of voyeurism until six months after their cruise. Lawyers for the cruise company say this is what “caused their alleged emotional distress.”

But why it took so long for the victims to find out and why RCL had not released the passenger list earlier is not addressed.

Refute Jane Doe

Prosecutors counter that Royal Caribbean greatly underestimates the extent of the harm suffered by the victims. Sexual assault and harassment do not require the physical contact that a cruise line requires, they say, citing experts.

“It is extremely interesting that (Royal Caribbean) is trying to characterize all of these allegations as mere ‘video voyeurism.’ Unfortunately, the acknowledged and undisputed facts are much darker and more damaging,” the lawyers wrote in an April 17, 2025, lawsuit. The behavior continued during the 12 cruises.

Victims’ advocates also cite federal laws, including the Maritime Act and the Ending Forced Arbitration Act, enacted by the US Congress in 2022 that bars employers from requiring arbitration of disputes related to sexual assault or harassment. Its full name is the Ending Forced Arbitration in Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Cases Act.

They said Mirasol “was never arrested by (Royal Caribbean), but was only arrested by these plaintiff victims, who themselves found hidden cameras in their rooms and who claim that RC has now stayed for more than five months.” Staying means trying to stop the trial.

“Incredibly, in its ongoing efforts to keep the full scope of these horrific facts hidden and out of public discussion, (Royal Caribbean) is in fact trying to convince this court that none of the pending claims can be deemed to be related to ‘sexual assault disputes,’ as defined in the Forced Arbitration Termination Act.

judge

While Royal Caribbean’s lawyers object to that challenge, the matter now falls to Judge Shaw-Feleder, who will issue a ruling that will be closely watched and could have important consequences, especially in the digital age as cameras have become smaller and cheaper.

Shaw Wilder A native of Miami Gardens, a graduate of Hialeah-Miami Lakes Senior High School and a law degree from the University of Miami, she was nominated in 2024 as a federal judge by President Joe Biden.

But two Republican senators from Florida blocked the appointment of a longtime partner with the Coral Gables law firm Kozyak Tropin & Throckmorton.

In May, federal district court judges appointed her as a district judge to fill a vacancy. She now has a critical case on her hands with a big question.

© 2025 Miami Herald. Visit at miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Originally published: October 10, 2025 at 7:58 AM EST