Clarence V. Russell

Introduction

Clarence “Rusty” V. Russell is a 75-year-old Paul Smiths, New York, man who had worked as a Santa Claus performer at Santa’s Workshop — the historic Christmas-themed park in Wilmington — for roughly a decade before his September 2026 arrest on child-sex charges. Ticonderoga police arrested Russell on September 5, 2026, and charged him with second-degree attempted rape of a victim less than 15 years old, a felony, along with attempted endangering the welfare of a child, after investigators said he communicated online with people he believed were arranging sexual encounters with minors. The charges, announced publicly nearly two weeks later, put a decades-old family attraction at the center of a child-exploitation investigation and drew national tabloid attention.

Background Information

Santa’s Workshop, where family members told NBC5 that Russell worked, opened in July 1949 and stands in Wilmington, New York, in the hamlet of North Pole near Whiteface Mountain — one of the earliest theme parks in America. Russell lived in Paul Smiths, in the Adirondacks, and per the Daily Gazette had performed as a Santa at the park for around ten years. The park is owned by Oswego-based landlord Douglas S. Waterbury, whom the Gazette noted has faced his own unrelated criminal charges over the decades involving sexual crimes against tenants — context the paper provided alongside the Russell case. Nothing in the reporting indicates the alleged conduct occurred at the park itself; the investigation, per police, concerned online activity.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Allegations. The claims in this section come from charging statements by the Ticonderoga Police Department and social-media videos described in news coverage. They are allegations at the charging stage: Russell has been charged but not tried, is presumed innocent, and has not been adjudicated guilty of anything. Neither Russell nor an attorney for him is quoted offering a defense in the available reporting, and the police department and Santa’s Workshop did not immediately respond to the Post’s request for comment.

Ticonderoga police said Russell scoured the internet and sent messages to people he believed were arranging sexual encounters with children under the age of 15. The department’s own statement, quoted by the Gazette, said “a police investigation determined that the suspect had been communicating via the internet with individuals he believed to be arranging sexual encounters with minors.” NBC5’s account was consistent: police said Russell had been communicating online with people he believed to be underage children in an effort to arrange sexual encounters.

On September 5, 2026, Ticonderoga Police arrested Russell and charged him with second-degree attempted rape of a victim less than 15 years old — a felony — and attempted endangering the welfare of a child, a misdemeanor. The arrest was announced September 17 in a department press release, per NBC5. The Gazette reported that videos posted by Eric Arthurs, a sting operator who goes by “The Underagent,” appear to show the arrest and describe an operation in which Arthurs posed as a fictional single mother offering her children, then read graphic messages Russell allegedly sent in front of police — an account characterized as “what appears to be” a vigilante sting, with the alleged messages themselves attributed and unproven. Police urged anyone with information to contact them and said the investigation is ongoing.

Public Reaction and Consequences

The charges became public on September 17, 2026, when Ticonderoga Police distributed their press release, and local and national outlets picked up the case the same week — NBC5 and Sun Community News first, then the New York Post under the headline “Sicko upstate NY worker at Santa’s Workshop theme park targeted kids online for sex.” Russell’s booking photo, released through the Ticonderoga Police Department, circulated with the coverage, visually tying the man who had played Santa to the allegations. The confrontation between his decade-long public role as a children’s holiday figure and the attempted-rape charge generated the story’s reach, though no statement from the park, the owner, or Russell himself had been reported. The Post reported that neither the Ticonderoga Police Department nor Santa’s Workshop immediately responded to its request for comment.

Current Status

As of mid-September 2026, Russell has been charged with second-degree attempted rape of a victim under 15 and attempted endangering the welfare of a child, and the police investigation remains open — NBC5 reported it is ongoing, with police soliciting further information. No arraignment outcome, plea, bail status, or trial date appears in the available reporting, and he has not been convicted of anything. Whether Santa’s Workshop has ended or suspended his employment is not stated in any fetched report; the park and the police department both declined immediate comment to the Post.

Impact on Their Career/Life

Russell’s arrest effectively terminates his decade-long run as one of the park’s Santas in any practical sense: a 75-year-old man now faces a felony count of attempted rape of a child and a misdemeanor charge, with his booking photo attached to national coverage naming Santa’s Workshop directly. The park — a Wilmington institution since 1949 — must absorb the reputational spillover of the case regardless of its outcome, a dynamic the Gazette’s decision to pair the arrest with the owner’s unrelated legal history only underlines. For Russell personally, the path forward runs through the courts on charges that, if proven, carry severe penalties; until then the record consists of the charges, the police account of his alleged online communications, and the unanswered question of how a children’s holiday performer came to be the subject of a child-exploitation investigation.