Prosecutors won't press charges on Predators caught in Dateline Sting

Law enforcement should not be made to be entertainment.
The show is trash, and I hope this incident puts an end to it.

 

Well said Max.

I'd much rather be watching 'who wants to marry a millionaire' 'cops' or 'the peoples court' anyways.

This investigative journalism has to stop.

 

i don't think the shows you mentioned are nearly as harmful. it's one thing to ride along with cops...it's another to literally create the context of the crime.

i would hardly call this investigative journalism.

 

I agree, I could never put my finger on it but something about that show always repulsed me, and I'm not talking about the admittedly sicko pedophiles. The whole spectacle of the dateline guys logging on and pretending to be kids and encouraging thiese guys fantasies and encouraging them to attempt to realize them seemed almost coounterproductive and like their interests were aligned with pedophilia in order to get ratings. And I agree also that calling it "investigative journalism" is a huge stretch of that term. Very little investigation involved. Gotcha journalims is probably the better term.

 

i really cant stand that show..but it always seems to be on. what kind of sick people like watching that?

 

Is it (the bolded text) what you would call entrapment? In my very strong opinion, the pitfalls of entrapment far outweigh the benefits, especially in the case of pedophile probes. I won't be surprised if there are actually more perverted adults from groups like "Perverted Justice" posing as libido-charged kids than real ones on the internet to lure *potential* "pedophiles" into the traps.

 

I see it as entrapment...apparently criminal procedure does not.

Let's assume for a minute that all our sexual urges are pre-programmed. I'm not sure if that's true or not...but let's assume they're all hard-wired in our brains.

Here you have a company preying on that by drawing these people in with serious temptation to commit what is also a criminal offense. I'm with Sam. It's like you're relying on those urges to get you ratings so you can turn around and sell your air time for a higher price to advertisers. I think that's disgusting. Instead of finding ways to help counsel these people away from that...they draw them in by pretending to be children interested in their advances. And the consequences?? Ruined lives. In this case, suicide.

 

Fair enough.

I haven't seen the show. Didn't realize it was a series, so I gave Dateline more credence then they might deserve.

Of course, according to the article, 8 of the previous shows resulted in charges. And the prosecution isn't alleging entrapment or falsehoods. Sometimes law enforcement needs a kick in the backside to move forward on these issues.

 

Pedophiles.

 

I agree with you on the dancing for ratings bit.

But the preying here was by these guys hoping to hook up with kids. At what point should a grown man simply know you don't agree to a rendezvous with a kid you meet in some pervert chat room? I know it's in effect a public shaming....and in that, there's no due process. But if he's deranged enough to go to a place to meet the kid he loses his ability to be considered a victim in this. IMO.

 

Totally agree (if this means I in turn agree with SamFisher then so be it. ). Prevention and counseling should be the way to deal with those potential [emphasis added] pedophiles. The last thing this society wants is to unnecessarily and artificially foster the kind of environment in which many otherwise "normal" Johns may be transformed into criminals.

The ethics of the media profiting from such show is a whole another matter.

 

This show is highly entertaining if it came out on DVD I'd probaly buy it. It's pretty comical to me

 

I can't believe some of the responses.

I have never seen the show but I have seen it advertised. I think I get the premise. Bait pedos to show up at some underaged girl's house for sex and whip out the cameras instead. This is a very good thing.

I don't really see the entrapment angle completely either. As an analogy, I have a car that will 120 mph. There is a freeway near my house that allows for that speed (but speed limit is 60 mph). Should be I feel "entrapped" if I get caught doing 120 in a 60 mph zone? They should not have made a freeway that would allow that speed and put it next to my house. They should not made a car that would do 120. In no way, should I feel personally responsible for the crime.

Now having sex with underaged girls is a much more serious matter ...

These pedos are trolling for the girls, looking to get lucky. They damn well knew what they were doing was wildly illegal and immoral. And they likely knew that Dateline was running a nationwide sting operation. And they likely knew that local police could also be running sting ops. But they still could not control their little head ...

 

That's not the same analogy - yours excises the entrapment angle and confuses it with opportunity. What if NBC had a show called "to catch a speeder" and sent you a bunch of emails encouraging you to do 120 and then filmed it and put it on TV when you were caught - would you not at least think it was unseemly on the part of NBC? I sure would.

 

So identifying sexual predators before they go after real children is a bad thing? What if you had people posing as al Qaeda recruiters and you were able to catch terrorists before they attacked anyone? Would that also be bad? I thought the show was a great concept, using the power of the media to the benefit of the people. I also thought the show was entertaining to watch. If anyone deserves to be humiliated on national television, it is someone that is trying to hurt children.

 

Let's not get sidetracked by Noworries analogy.

His post was dead on....unless Dateline created this chat room, lured unsuspecting men to that chatroom, and somehow convinced them to go against their better judgement to meet up with these kids. Even then...I'm having trouble siding with the guys on this one.

In the end, this is not much different from shame the johns campaigns that neigbourhoods run to address prostitution in their communities when the police won't do much.

These guys thought they were meeting up with kids for sex. They went there willingly. Maybe 'gotcha journalism' is fitting. But I'm OK with it. Let's not lose sight of what these men were trying to do.

 

If I was in a chat room where everybody talk about breaking the law and then someone encourage me to do so ... It is not like Dateline broke in to some guy's house and sent a naked 14 year old girl after him to catch it on film. I think that one must also look at intent and pre-meditation.