MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A Mid-South man is behind bars for filming a 14-year-old boy in the bathroom stall of a Greyhound bus station. Thankfully, someone was able to step in to stop the man in the act.
The man who reported the crime said when he realized what was happening, he felt he had no choice but to take matters into his own hands.
“I said ‘Did you record me? Be honest. Don’t lie,’ because he already admitted that he was recording, he just didn’t say who,” Kyle ‘Kandler’ Lemaitre said. “I said ‘Well, who were you recording, then?’ He said the guy next over. I said ‘You mean the kid?'”
Lemaitre said he was at the Greyhound bus station on Airways Boulevard when he noticed something strange in the restroom.
“Recording somebody under the stall, I don’t care how old you are, it’s still creepy,” he said.
Memphis Police said 38-year-old Leonardo Edwards is charged with sexual exploitation of a minor after Lemaitre reported he was filming the 14-year-old boy in the bathroom.
“I was actually going to take matters into my own hands, and he would’ve left in an ambulance,” Lemaitre said.
Lemaitre said he noticed a shadow under the stall next to him. He said when he looked underneath the stall, he saw Edwards secretly filming someone.
When he realized the victim was a child, Lemaitre said he notified security and found the child’s grandmother, then he confronted Edwards.
“When I asked him about his phone and what he was doing with it, he decided to run,” Lemaitre said. “So I put him in a headlock and tripped him. We had to physically detain him until Memphis Police showed up.”
Lemaitre said his goal is to one day be an officer and based on past experiences, he felt it was his duty to intervene.
“I don’t consider myself a hero, I consider myself an obligated citizen,” he said.
Edwards will face a judge Thursday morning.
