Pedo Hunter in Area

I think these groups often do great work considering how under resourced the police are. The problem I have with them though is the way they name and shame the pedos on social media. No consideration for the families, the person’s kids, who may well have their lives made total hell at school after everyone finds out daddy’s a pedo. They should just hand them over to the police without the social media outing. Or at the very least don’t put them online until they’ve been 100% proved guilty

Yes that's spreading like a cancer alas. Would a 'pedophile' not be someone who loves feet? The misspelling leads to mispronunciation...peddo - file.

Vigilantes are often dodgy enough themselves. 41% of the men arrested after the Farage riots had records of domestic abuse iirc?

Do they find time to do this between shinnying up lampposts, painting roundabouts, and trying to set fire to hotels ?

Oh ok.

Wow that is terrifying, and a very effective way to intimidate people into compliance.

Racist and xenophobic flag shaggers who follow Tommy Robinson etc

Many of them exposed as sex offenders, domestic abusers and violent criminals whilst protesting about Muslim grooming gangs.

I don't doubt some of them mean well, but some are almost as disturbed as the people they are hunting.

If they were investigating anonymously and handing evidence to the police when they had built a case then it could only be a good thing. However strutting around like they are Batman, courting as much online attention and pats on the back as possible and risking getting it wrong as they are not trained as law enforcement is dangerous. I question the integrity and intentions of these people. I wonder if it’s more for them and their ego rather than protecting anyone.

I have an extended family member who was caught in a police 'sting' online. I think it's preferable to leave it in the hands of the police, they saw the process through properly and he was convicted. Scumbag.

Don't agree with extra-judicial 'justice' - it's something akin to lynching and a dangerous road to go down. Suspicious of people who need to make themselves look like a hero.

What does that last bit mean

Perhaps if someone is up to something nefarious, they can hand themselves in before being publicly humiliated and the police case will go much smoother.

That's just a theory, no idea if that's a tactic they use.

We had them here a few years ago kn the street behind us. We're also a small rural town.

They had posed as an underage girl and spoken to this man. They then turned up at his house with all the information and filmed it all, which was of course shared on the local Facebook page.

I'm of a mixed opinion because I believe it's good to route these people out but I think the whole thing was pretty traumatic for his family, who were home. Tbf, if the man hadn't been such a sicko, his family wouldn't have had to go through that.

The community is pretty great and rallied round the family and the wife promptly kicked him out.

In your shoes I might have a chat with the local police and get their take on it. It might either put your mind at ease or alert the police if this group are doing anything dodgy.

They can ruin a police case - I understand that much of their so called evidence is useless for court proceedings. There is a reason why it might be harder for the police to get a conviction - because they actually have to prove that a person is guilty beyond reasonable doubt, These vigilante groups can ruin innocent people's lives on the flimsiest of pretexts. And even if the person does agree to meet up you just have to wonder if the person would ever have offended if the opportunity to interact with "children" was not dangled in front of them. Frankly, I think they are little more than modern versions of the old lynch mobs. The nasty truth is that young people are much more likely to be abused by people they know or who are part of their family.

Ah the all sharing brain cells brigade, next they accidentally poke themselves in the eye wiith their pitchforks while smashing beer cans on their skulls

And these imbeciles manage to fine people to breed with, I would feel sorry for their partners but they picked them their judgement is juat as appalling

We had an "organisation" where i live they regularly posted feet walking along then knocked on doors and showed more feet and muted conversations. Then started showing faces, a mob of locals vandalised the wrong house the man who lived there had to be moved he didn't do anything, the group dissapeared off the internet after that incident.

It was stuff like this that got the home of a paediatrician set alight in Paulsgrove in the late 1970's.

It's dangerous, but our police are so overstretched I'm not sure what else people can do.

Well I think the good ones are bloody great 👍

I’m not a fan due to the possibilities of them

getting the wrong person

jeopardising cases due to entrapment

why does it have to be done in a blaze of glory surely it’s all about stopping paedophiles rather than internet likes

they should crack on with there work discreetly and hand it over to the authorities

I have no time for these vigilante groups, locally we had a guy that a lot of people knew had a conviction dating back some 20 years - most of us just gave him a swerve and warned kids to stay away.

Of course leopards don't chase their spots and he was caught out in an internet sting by one of these groups - however well intentioned that might have been, it resulted in a court case, which was thrown out, because it was a sting and therefore not legal procedure. He is therefore still knocking around and a police officer friend tells me it just makes it more difficult for them as he will be more careful, and if he is still operating will do so much more under the radar.

Their intentions may be honourable, but they can cause the guilty to walk free.

Self appointed vigilantes are dangerous, often racist and not very clever.

You won't get rid of them through organisations like this.