Posted on 08/14/2007 4:27:34 AM PDT by Dudoight
The show was an instant success. It lured would-be child-sex predators to a public shaming, delivered by a handsome host. Ratings, awards and even praise from members of Congress followed. But now Dateline NBC's "To Catch a Predator" series is taking heat. And so is the police chief of the Collin County town that hosted it eight months ago. The troubles stem from the show's visit to Murphy, where more than 20 people were arrested but escaped prosecution because of evidence problems. Also a former district attorney ensnared in the sting shot himself.
(Excerpt) Read more at dallasnews.com ...
So what happened?
Technically, they did not “walk”. They got busted. They just didn’t serve time.
NBC are playing with fire by trying to make $$ and get ratings by trapping pedophiles. No one comes out of this looking good, as far as I am concerned. Imagine the reaction if some nut job comes to the party heavily armed - and blows away Chris Hanson or his staff, on film.
It might be interesting to find out why he did that. Was a transcript with no witnesses, no video, and no audio sufficent "proof" to warrant a warrant? Might it instead have something to do with the presence of the famous Dateline crew in this sleepy town of 13,000 ? Naaah. Couldnt be..
By all accounts, Conradt did not lure anybody to his house. His real name and address was found through a web search by the people running the sting.
They were arrested. They were punished. But they were never prosecuted and they never pled guilty.
As long as Dateline NBC never makes a mistake, never lies, and never shades the truth in order to make sensationalistic TV, I guess there is nothing to worry about. And everybody knows that Dateline NBC would never do any of those things.
Since when did FReepers start trusting the MSM?
Who knows? All they had was a bunch of "transcripts", made by someone, from somewhere, implicating someone by name, and signed by anonymous... IOW, no Dateline, no arrest.
In this case, they do not. They don’t need to do that. The perps do everything for them. I think that is what is so fascinating about the program.
So was he not even part of the conversations to have sex with a minor?
From what I read, the DA gave the decoy his information.
Since they decided that hating "perverts" was more important than due process, fairness, truth, and presumption of innocence.
These men weren’t called up on the phone and solicited by teenage girls.
I *believe* that one possible scenario is that the decoy trolls for men in internet chat rooms. Within seconds, he/she gets a number of “hits” and then they start chatting.
Then over a period of what may be several weeks, there are IM or chat conversations *some of which may be initiated by the decoy*.
My guess is sometimes the mark initiates the conversations, but sometimes it the decoy.
This was brought out in one of the shows where one of the marks was relating how he told the decoy to “leave him alone” and that he was going to “report her to yahoo”.
Sooo - was there any solicitation here?
Initially, almost certainly not. But later on, it seems that the decoys do make contact with the marks.
What constitutes a new IM chat session versus a continuation of an old one? How much time has to pass?
I’m sure if I were a defense lawyer I’d be asking a lot of these questions.
Please don’t think that I’m defending the pervs who get caught, because I’m not.
I’m just pointing out that the situation may be not so cut and dry as your post might make it seem.
You sure it was the DA and not someone else? Someone hear a voice or see an image? How about we just bust into his house with dogs and guns and make sure the whole world sees it?? Then we'll make him confess, for sure!
It’s a vile program with obscene language being spewed over the airwaves. I’ve watched a few segments, but then the language got coarser. I won’t watch it at all now. I think the show is there just to see how much they can get away with; how much obscene language they can air without getting censored.
Maybe. Maybe not. Are you going to take Dateline NBC's word for it?
It would be very interesting to ask the dead guy what he was thinking. But you can't... he's dead!
The article said they talked via cell phone. It would be next to impossible to figure out a person’s identity just from a chat. If you watch the show, you will see a lot of cell phone activity.
I think Conradt gave the decoy his e-mail address and a telephone number. Perverted Justice tracked him down from that.
What presumption of innocence does he have if he shows up at the house, and transcripts are read of comments that he made online???
Except that poor DA.. But hes the exception that proves the rule!!
True but he did not end the conversation and ended up appearing at the house after telling her to leave him alone. Kinda hard to accuse the decoy when he drives over. She didn't go to his house.
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