Updated ,first published
An inner west man allegedly pretending to work for Disney to lure aspiring young actors into sex acts has been charged with a slew of offences, including procuring a child for prostitution.
Gerard Vamadevan, 57, was arrested on Friday after police investigated reports he allegedly falsified documents and posed as a casting agent offering false career opportunities in exchange for sexual activity, NSW Police said.
Police officers executed a search warrant at a Lewisham home on Friday, seizing documentation and electronic devices.
Vamadevan was charged with offences relating to false identification, stalking and intimidation, and child prostitution.
In a bizarre bail court application on Saturday afternoon, Vamadevan admitted to being on a sugar daddy-style website – which connects older men willing to pay for the company of younger women – and to going out for coffee and dinner with some of his alleged victims.
He paid for the dinners, the court heard.
“All I did was have a cup of coffee and talk to them, one or two had dinner with me,” he said.
“I was lonely and looking for a bit of company. I went about it the wrong way to try and build a network.
“My erectile performance doesn’t work any more,” he added.
Vamadevan was previously jailed for similar offences, the court heard. The Daily Telegraph reported that he was pretending to be a “talent scout” for Channel Seven and making sexually explicit phone calls to 46 different women.
The self-represented litigant said that at the time of the offending – in 2022 – he was heavily self-medicating with alcohol and that things are different now.
Vamadevan, who says he works as a pharmaceutical executive for a Philippines-based company, said he was supporting his teenage law student daughter, although he was forced to leave the family home when he was imprisoned in 2022.
He said he is involved in civil proceedings with Disney and that arresting officers came into his home and threw him on the ground “like a terrorist”.
Vamadevan convinced the magistrate of his need to be at liberty and was granted bail on Saturday afternoon.
He is only allowed to use the internet for work purposes and must provide police with the details of his phone and NBN connection, as well as report to Mascot Police Station.
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