Boca Raton Teen Charged With Soliciting Minor on Social Media Platform

Christian Mammarella (Photo: Palm Beach County Jail)

An 18-year-old Boca Raton man was arrested after his Snapchat account was flagged as having viewed explicit images of a person who was suspected to have been underage, and was later found to have been allegedly actively soliciting an underage user to send illegal content, police charged.

Boca Raton police initially began investigating the in April 2025 after receiving a tip from the National Center for Missing and Endangered Children, which had been notified by Snapchat of the images being sent over its platform beginning in January 2025. The company had used its systems to automatically preserve the messages sent over its platform for a future law enforcement investigation, the report stated.

Police found the account holder used an e-mail address linked to a private high school in Boca Raton, and identified the user as Christian Mammarella, 18, of Boca Raton after consulting with the school, according to the report. City police would later issue a subpoena to Comcast to determine the user behind the IP address that was utilized to share the alleged images. While reviewing the results of the search warrant, the detective turned up additional information that the same user had allegedly messaged another person on the platform asking her to share photographs of her genitalia. That conversation was preserved for evidence, the report stated, but not included in a probably cause affidavit filed with the court.

As the investigation continued, detectives collected additional images shared on Snapchat, including some that were linked to the user by comparing a photo to the suspect’s driver’s license. An explicit chat, the text of which has been withheld in this story, allegedly accompanied the photograph.

While the images were allegedly shared with others, “there is no evidence that [the suspect] solicited other minors, nor is there any proof that the reported image was sent to any minors,” the report stated. The investigation continued into the summer, with the resulting charges having been filed this week.

Mammarella was charged with soliciting a child for unlawful sexual conduct using using a computer device, and was arrested Feb. 17, 2026. He was freed later the same day after posting $10,000 bail.