Pembroke Pines man faces 10 new charges after second child porn arrest, cops say
A Pembroke Pines man arrested for soliciting sexual videos from minors via an online gaming platform is behind bars again and facing new charges, according to the Pembroke Pines Police Department.
Detectives jailed Manuel Rodriguez, 19, for a second time on Tuesday, April 7, after a March 25 search of his cellphone revealed “approximately 50 videos of child sexual assault material,” according to his arrest report.
He’s now facing 10 felony counts of possession of child pornography, police say.
Rodriguez was first jailed on March 25 after federal and state authorities received a tip from Roblox, an online platform that hosts millions of user-created games and chat rooms, claiming he’d asked an 8-year-old girl for explicit photos and videos.
Roblox officials flagged a Nov. 5 conversation between the two during which he was allegedly “enticing children to video chat while exposing the child’s genitals in exchange for Robux,” or in-game currency.
The gaming platform has been criticized for years over poor moderation and lax restrictions that have enabled child predators, and it began requiring age verification to access chat features in January.
Pembroke Pines Police Department Special Victims Unit detectives were tapped into the probe on Jan. 12, and conducted a months-long investigation before Rodriguez’s March 25 arrest, agency spokesperson Amanda Conwell told the Pembroke Pines News.
When taken in for questioning, Rodriguez told investigators that he’d previously traded Robux for explicit photos or videos from minors and was aware of the girl’s age when requesting “sexually explicit videos of her touching herself,” his first arrest report says.
The 19-year-old, who lives in west Pines, was originally jailed on one felony charge of obscene use of a computer to seduce, solicit or lure a child, released on a $10,000 bond and placed on house arrest the same day he was first booked.
Jail records now show Rodriguez being held at Broward’s Main Jail on a $75,000 bond as of April 8.
This story was originally published April 8, 2026 at 11:38 AM.
