Cruise ship passenger jumps overboard allegedly to avoid $16,000 gambling debt

A person who jumped off a Royal Caribbean cruise ship close to the Port of San Juan over the weekend — allegedly to avoid paying off more than $16,000 in gambling debt to the cruise line — has been charged with a federal crime, authorities said.

Jey Gonzalez-Diaz embarked on the Rhapsody of the Seas at the Port of San Juan on Aug. 31, according to a legal grievance filed Sunday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico. The cruise ship returned from Barbados on Sunday — when Gonzalez-Diaz jumped into the water as the ship disembarked around 9:15 a.m. local time, during U.S. Customs and Border Protection inspection, the legal grievance said.

Gonzalez-Diaz was then introduced to shore by somebody passing by on a jet ski, investigators said. The second was captured on surveillance video.

CBP officers later situated Gonzalez-Diaz close to the Puerto Rico Capitol Building, court paperwork said. He was carrying $14,600 in money, two telephones and 5 IDs.

Gonzalez-Diaz is accused of making an attempt to avoid financial reporting necessities when touring into the United States, according to the legal grievance.

As acknowledged in the grievance, Gonzalez-Diaz told officers in Spanish that he jumped off the cruise ship because “he did not want to report the currency on his possession because he thought he was going to be taxed duties for bring in the currency.”

Upon additional investigation, Royal Caribbean told investigators that Gonzalez-Diaz was booked under the title Jeremy Diaz, and that he owed $16,710.24 to the cruise line, according to the grievance. The debt was “almost exclusively associated to Casino and Gaming expenses,” the grievance said.

Other document checks of Gonzalez-Diaz’s a number of identifications also revealed that a Jeremy Omar Gonzalez-Diaz has been in federal custody at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, since January, according to the grievance. Jey Gonzalez-Diaz told investigators that it was his brother.

When they requested him for his full title, he told investigators, “If you guys were good at your job, you would know that,” the grievance said.

Jey Gonzalez-Diaz was later launched on bail, local media Wapa.TV reported.

If convicted, Jey Gonzalez-Diaz may face a wonderful up to $250,000 or a most five-year prison sentence, or both. It wasn’t immediately clear if he has legal illustration.

NIH whistleblower says she was ousted after clashing with Trump officers on vaccines

13-year-old arrested, 23 weapons seized after alleged college capturing menace

Inside Apple’s 2025 launch event