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Original poster

(Trigger warning) to find Facebook live videos confronting pedophiles

26 replies

Tooearlyforadrink · 27/10/2019 13:36

Just so uncomfortable? ...wrong maybe? I don’t know how to describe it.

Obviously I don’t agree with what they have done and I would never want a child to have to go through that and a pedophile should be locked up.

Also the whole creating a decoy child to catch them I do agree with.

It’s the whole confronting them, having their location posted to encourage a mob to join them, just having them stand there with people hurling abuse and threatening violence ... and in some cases inciting violence

Literally just had one now shared on Facebook happening right now.

I don’t want to live in a world with people savaged on the streets. I’d rather live in a world where people are punished by the legal system.

I’ve also read that by publicly confronting them this lessens the chance of them being sentenced. Could be wrong but?

OP posts:
gwackywacky · 27/10/2019 13:38

This sounds insane. So who is producing the videos?

tumbleisatwat · 27/10/2019 13:40

Don't watch them then?

Original poster
Tooearlyforadrink · 27/10/2019 13:47

Don't watch them then?

What a great response! I mean there are crimes happening all over the world but if we just pretend it’s not happening and live in our own bubble then it doesn’t matter.

OP posts:
Original poster
Tooearlyforadrink · 27/10/2019 13:49

This sounds insane. So who is producing the videos?

A team of people will create fake accounts posing as a child and talk to pedophiles and build up a case on them.

They will then arrange to meet them and confront the pedophile by starting a Facebook live video and get people to share it.

OP posts:
tumbleisatwat · 27/10/2019 13:49

It's not pretending it's not happening.

We have the police. There is no need for random people on Facebook to watch that stuff.

It's a modern day stoning.

Original poster
Tooearlyforadrink · 27/10/2019 13:53

Well that’s exactly my point? Confused

OP posts:
LoveNote · 27/10/2019 13:57

Have a read on the law pages.com

Quite a few pardophiles have been caught by these vigilante groups and successfully sentenced, I was surprised when I read this and the accompanying summing up notes by the judge.

If it makes just one paedophile stop/think twice then it’s achieved something

LoveNote · 27/10/2019 13:58

*paedophiles fgs!

Nursejackie1 · 27/10/2019 14:07

It’s going to happen when men get at most a few months in jail away from general pop so the poor poppets don’t get hurt. Then return back to their old lives where much of the time their families stand by them, blame the internet for leading them down this dark path etc. Blame anyone but the peado themselves. They get a slap on the wrist and a few months later are getting their kicks from looking at/ carrying out vile abuse on innocent kids. They deserve all they get from these groups in my opinion. I couldn’t give a shit what they go through... I do care about what they put those poor kids through.

Biker47 · 27/10/2019 14:08

I always get a weird vibe from the types of people who organise these things, in fact I think there might have been a few cases of them not being as clean as you would expect, ca't recall the exact details though.

comedycentral · 27/10/2019 14:10

I don't agree with them either. Why don't they just hand over the intelligence to the police? Why film it.
There was one in my town and the young lad in the video had been talking to someone he thought was a teen girl online. He clearly had learning difficulties and special needs but they goaded him so much in the film and repeated his name. It wasn't right at all. It would have been better to just inform the police of what he had been up to.

JamieVardysHavingAParty · 27/10/2019 14:14

LoveNote

I assure you the "live confrontation of facebook" step does not improve conviction rates.

It amazes and appalls me in equal measure that these people are so eager for their sting operation to go viral, but don't think any further about who might be watching.

When these vigilantes confront their targets and tell them that they're letting the police know about the message logs, that amounts to explicitly telling them (and anyone connected with them!) to microwave their hard-drives before the police come round!

Ever noticed what kind of time the police do raids on circles of suspected child abusers? Dawn. So no-one raided has the opportunity to send a text to other people, telling them to destroy the contents of their hard drive.

Squoozie · 27/10/2019 14:15

If it makes just one paedophile stop/think twice then it’s achieved something

There have also been cases of mistaken identity/wrong addresses targeted. Do you think 'just one' of these cases is worth the achievement too?

DaisyDreaming · 27/10/2019 14:17

I watched a documentary on this, the police even said how it could jeopardise prosecution. If they want to do this they should get all the detail and evidence and hand it over rather than this. Also there’s always a chance of mistakes. I remember a poor paediatrician was once beaten up because some idiot didn’t know the difference between ‘child doctor’ and ‘paedophil’

JamieVardysHavingAParty · 27/10/2019 14:17

Read this: www.theguardian.com/society/2016/jul/13/shining-a-light-on-the-dark-web-how-the-police-ended-up-running-a-paedophile-site

This is how Richard Huckle was caught by the professionals. By catching other child abusers and keeping it quiet.

PinkFlamingo888 · 27/10/2019 14:19

These vigilantes have been known to scupper cases because of their actions. I don’t agree with it at all. People have the right to be cautioned, have a solicitor and be investigated before they are formally charged and identified by the police. Regardless of the crime, people shouldn’t have their personal details shared including addresses etc. It’s still their family home and not the fault of parents/ other family members who are the ones left behind to deal with criminal damage which is usually then inflicted on them. What I find worst of all is that 9 times out of 10, the offenders seem to have additional needs. I’m still not saying that what they’ve done is right but if they’re vulnerable themselves they definitely deserve an appropriate adult to support them with the questioning and I also question the fake child part and how leading catching them out may be.

staydazzling · 27/10/2019 14:20

a group of vigillante hunters were recently in court on charges of false imprisonment, i think. its time we made them. illegal.

lyralalala · 27/10/2019 14:20

If it makes just one paedophile stop/think twice then it’s achieved something

And who cares if the odd few lives are ruined in the process

The group near us were absolutely lambasted by the police after their “live raid” that they plastered all over Facebook. They went to the wrong house, started yelling at the poor woman who opened the door “do you know he’s a paedo” and there was genuine concern for the families safety for a while. Even now, over a year later, the man says he notices people keeping their kids away from him ‘just in case’

Meanwhile the guy in the next street, who the police were in the middle of investigating, was alerted to the group when they told him they were coming to his house and had gone on the run. Nice work...

Vigilante justice gets it wrong far far too many times for it to be a good thing

JenniR29 · 27/10/2019 14:26

It’s vigilantism. It might make a small group of people feel like they have achieved justice when in reality their actions are dangerous and can cause cases to collapse. Best to leave this sort of thing to the professionals.

easyandy101 · 27/10/2019 14:27

I knew a very vocal pedo hunter

Is actually a pedo

I've not watched many videos of this type but have seen some where the person confronted was clearly a vulnerable person themselves, with learning disabilities or other impairments

This is not the right way to go about things

recrudescence · 27/10/2019 14:28

The live streaming can’t be for any other reason than to incite prurient interest and mob justice. As others have said above, the aims of these paedophile hunters could be achieved without these antics. I would support them if their only aim was to support the police discreetly and effectively.

JamieVardysHavingAParty · 27/10/2019 14:37

I always get a weird vibe from the types of people who organise these things, in fact I think there might have been a few cases of them not being as clean as you would expect, ca't recall the exact details though.

Well, it's simple logic, really.

We know what lengths child abusers go to in order to work with children, and they manage it despite levels of safeguarding procedures set up to stop them.

Getting into a facebook-run vigilante group is going to be a clinch in comparison, and very useful to them.

BrokenWing · 27/10/2019 14:41

The paedophile hunter groups stream videos of their "captures" for no reason other than the glory and to show everyone what heroes they are (even if they are anonymous). Their reasons for what they do are not altruistic and should not go unquestioned. If they were doing it for the reasons they normally state they would do it quietly without the social media hype, praise and attention.

My FB went through a phase of these groups being shared in local pages I follow, each time one comes up I block the hunter group and thankfully most must be blocked as I haven't seen one for a long time now. I agree, they should be made illegal.

Candle1000 · 27/10/2019 14:46

I feel that it’s a way to make these vigilantes feel powerful, it’s all ‘look at me, what a hero I am’ type stuff. If someone discovers any paedofile activity then they can report it to the police without splashing it all over the internet.

Auba14 · 27/10/2019 15:00

I posted about this on here years ago and was flamed when I said how uncomfortable I was with it.

In a sense, I have nothing against these self proclaimed hunters if their end game is to contact the police and hand the details over. However, it’s not is it? Like the OP says it’s about Facebook streams, them having fame for what they do and pats on the back. And like a post further up says, they have no idea of what investigations are ongoing by the police and can quite easily get it wrong. That Stinson Hunter guy had something psychologically wrong with him, it was evident watching the show years ago.

And why would a regular everyday person want to do what they do? I feel sick at the thought of even interacting with people like that. It’s just all very self indulgent and odd.