PLANTATION, Fla. – Detectives uncovered a sordid series of chats, searches and child sexual abuse material in a Plantation woman’s online life, leading to her arrest on nearly a dozen felony charges, police allege in an arrest warrant.
Some of those chats included sexual fantasies about drowning — then raping — children, the warrant states. Police said they also found another disturbing discovery on Angela Marcella Rio’s phone: a video of her sexually abusing her own dog.
Recommended Videos
The 33-year-old made an appearance in Broward County court Monday after prosecutors filed formal charges earlier this month. Rio was originally arrested in mid-October and is facing 11 child pornography-related charges after police alleged that she possessed more than 100 “child exploitative/age-difficult” images and videos.
Police said Rio’s digital footprint showed a pattern of “fetishization and sexualization of children.”
A Plantation Police Department detective working for the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force wrote in the warrant that authorities initiated the investigation into Rio began May 5 after receiving multiple tips originating from the websites Reddit and Quora as well as messaging app Kik. They alleged that an account, ultimately traced back to Rio, uploaded multiple files of child sexual abuse material to the services.
During their investigation, police said they uncovered a series of Google searches indicating a sexual interest in children; those included queries like “mom and son porn” and “do babies feel sexual pleasure?”
They said they also found a series of chats with men online that revolved around sharing detailed sexual fantasies about young children, including content relating to an “underwater fetish,” in which police said she fantasized about drowning a child in one instance.
Police later served a search warrant at Rio’s home on Westree Lane. She denied having any sexual interest in children or possessing child sexual abuse material, the warrant states.
She told detectives any sexual chats were a “dirty thing” she did to “make money on the side” using Quora, a question-and-answer website, and adult-oriented website OnlyFans, police wrote.
According to the warrant, investigators obtained a warrant to search Rio’s electronic devices and found 115 child sexual abuse or “age-difficult” images or videos on her phone.
The files were described in graphic detail in the arrest warrant. Detectives said the images and videos depicted boys and girls as young as 2 being raped or otherwise sexually abused by men or women.
Authorities said the iPhone 11 contained another disturbing discovery: a video of Rio making her dog, “Phoebe,” perform a sex act on her.
“Her dog is easily accessible and cannot consent to this act or voice the abuse,” detectives wrote. “This act shows how accustomed and accepted Rio is to the idea of exploiting and controlling the vulnerable with the intent to gratify her own deviant sexual desires.”
Authorities would take Rio into custody afterward.
No charges related to animal abuse or bestiality are included in Rio’s court file. She has pleaded not guilty to the child pornography charges.
Rio’s Fort Lauderdale-based attorney, A. Randall Haas, told Local 10 News he intends to “aggressively” defend her in court.
“Although I am not at liberty to discuss the accusations against her or our anticipated defenses to the crimes charged, I will say that Angela should be presumed innocent until the state attorney proves to a jury of her peers that she is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt,” Haas said in a statement. “Having said that, I remain confident that once all of the evidence is borne out, and Ms. Rio receives her due process in a court of law, the allegations against her will be seen through a totally different lens.”
According to Broward court records, Rio’s next hearing is scheduled for January.