“Paedophile hunters”

[Yellowdaffodilss]

I remember quite a few years ago now, these paedophile hunter’s started appearing on social media. Videos of them meeting people who had been talking to what they believed were underage children. I remember thinking , oh wow they’re out there protecting our children. Maybe a naive view , I don’t know.

But now , more and more , I see it becoming a regular thing and I am seeing time and time again that the so called predators they catch ( not all the time, there are times that they are grown adults knowing what they’re doing ) are very clearly people with additional needs / autism. I find it disturbing to watch - I have seen young adults panicking and not really knowing what they’re doing or the implications . It’s clear that the messages in the videos I have seen are between the “ culprit” and an ‘underage child’ discussing meeting up , when yes they have been clear they are underage but it is also clear that it has not been sexual talk and these people are not understanding that what they are doing is wrong.

I remember years ago my sister and her friend talking to a lad of around 19. My sister and her friend were chatting and asking if the lad liked the friend and he was inviting them around to his house for a sleepover and to watch movies. ( my sister told my mom as she was worried ) I went through all the messages and could see it was not sexual . This lad thought they were friends . I looked at his profile and he was clearly autistic and his emotional and mental age was probably the same as my sister and her friend. I spoke to his mother who was so thankful that I messaged and confirmed he was quite severely autistic.

My son is autistic and always been drawn to girls as friends rather than boys . He also always gets on with those younger because he is on their level more. He wouldn’t even know how to talk sexually - he’s got a very limited understanding. I can’t stop him having a phone , he’s now 18 . Luckily I’m very aware and have spoken to him about this and keep tabs on him but it’s very hard. This kind of thing really worries me.

It makes me think whether these groups are doing more harm than good. They’re outing people publicly , and for those who are vulnerable with no understanding then it could do so much harm. I get that parents should be monitoring phone use but quite frankly not all parents do.

I do also wonder - can charges be made if there is no ‘real’ victim - it’s an adult they’re talking to … I guess it could get the culprits investigated more and maybe find out more things but other than that is it not just vigilante behaviour? And also , is their real good intention there from all of them or is it a case of getting social media famous ? Could it even be that they target those who they can see are more vulnerable as it will be an easy ‘catch’ ?

YANBU.

I see it all the time.

people are thick as shite and often can’t tell that someone has a learning disability or they just don’t care:

that’s why the police dislike these vigilante groups:

I think you make a very good point and these groups are just vigilantes that will be looking videos that will get them the most clicks rather than actually trying to investigate the serious offenders.

I'm pretty sure that a crime is committed by someone if they go to meet an underaged person for sex even if they don't exist. However, if these untrained "hunters" are just trying to entrap people then they may not get any evidence that could be used in a court anyway.

I think it's the sort of thing for trained professionals to do and not TikTok content creators

Of course they are doing more harm than good. They are vigilante groups. Vigillantism is illegal in the UK as it often leads to or insights violence against individuals who are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

My next door neighbour was visited by vigilantes for allegedly sending dick picks to a teenage boy. Neighbour definitely has some issues, you can tell when you talk to him but the way they behaved was absolutely awful, dragging him out to carry out a citizens arrest and trapping him in their car while they phoned the police. They actually seemed to be enjoying it.

A few years back one of these vigilante groups targeted the house of a young man because, according to them, he openly described himself as a paedophile. He was a paediatric nurse.

yanbu, its insane and terrible

and I often wonder about the criminal histories of those 'pedophile hunters' involved

disgusting

I do wonder how many of these men that have been 'caught' are convicted on the basis of the 'evidence' of the group

Quite a few!

I’m not sure how well their evidence stands up in court. Yes they’ll have screenshots, but you need more than that.

Have watched videos of them where they hunt someone who is genuinely a nonce and deserves everything they get. Usually with a devastated wife/kids in the background without a clue what’s going on.

do you have an idea of how many?

And don’t forget, the police themselves set these ‘traps’

not a bad idea, traps them and sends them to custody with no child victim to pat the price. SN or not….a child is saved from god knows what

Traps are fine in my opinion. If someone isn’t interested in being inappropriate with children, they won’t engage with any trap they come across. If they do engage, let the world collapse in on them.

It’s just awful. I saw one recently and a young boy was crying - he was quite obviously stimming - and he actually was answering so specific like they were saying how old are you and how old is she and he was answering with facts just like someone with autism would. It was heartbreaking and anyone with half a brain cell would be able to see that he was vulnerable and I just thought you actually are scum to do this .

Wow

Vigilantes caught a ex family friend. He denied everything, of course, but there was enough evidence on his computer to convict him.

He did time in prison, then was caught again (by the same vigilantes) not long after getting out. He’s back in prison.

Another man I know was targeted by them, there wasn’t enough evidence to convict, but the police kept an eye on him and he was arrested and jailed a few months later.

I’ve personally only seen accurate results from these groups, and given that they’ve caught two local men who otherwise would carry on with their paedophile antics I think parents of SN adults (and I include myself here) should be very careful to teach their dc that adult relationships with younger children are not appropriate (more from a safeguarding view for the child) or to help them find friendships that wouldn’t run the risk of them looking like paedophiles.

I agree this is awful, but I still don’t think adult/child relationships like this are appropriate in any way, whether the adult is autistic or not.

Hmm … I get the general jist of what you mean but when you say “ SN or not a child is saved from god knows what” what do you mean by that? Because it’s likely when it’s someone with SN that a child would never be in harm - this person thinks they have a friend and has no sinister motive but just simply doesn’t understand that a child should not be friends with an adult and in that case you have a person with SN traumatised. I don’t see how a child is saved there ?

But , I do reiterate - the parents of these individuals need to really be monitoring who they are talking to etc and talking about that. I had to have this conversation with my son - he does chat on social media , he posts about games etc and he has comments / messages - quite recently someone messaged him and commented on the game and they had a bit id a chat and he said “ how old are you ? “ and they said they were 15 ( no idea of gender they didn’t discuss it was just about the game ) and he just said “ sorry I am 18 “ blocked them and came and told me - I then had the chat again about not talking in private messages and not really chatting to strangers .

I'm pretty confused by your post OP. Do you think we should give predatory behaviour a pass if the person is ND?

No they are not , you’re right. But the autistic individual may not understand that. Most parents are on top of this , but there are some that don’t have anyone looking out for them like that and they are left to their own devices with no guidance

If it’s predatory behavior - talking about a relationship , being inappropriate- then no. Being autistic does not mean you also cannot be a paedophile. But there needs to be more awareness and trepidation.

Any group that effectively puts paedophiles away (preferably without a key) is fine by me.

But I’m not sure these ‘hunters’ are that. They’re often thick-as-shit self-publicists and aggro merchants who are more interested in the reflected glory of their righteous crusade than actually amassing legally enforceable evidence.

IIRC a lynch mob massed outside the house of a paediatrician during one child murder investigation, and defaced his property, which is a salutary lesson in the flaws of vigilante justice meted out by the indignant ignorant.

They ruined my friend's life for some unwise but not illegal sexual fantasy talk. He isn't a paedophile or convicted of anything but lost his job anyway because of the scandal caused to the university.

I don't think these people really care about children. If they did, they could just collect evidence, pass it to the police and let them take it forward. Which would be absolutely fine. Instead they'll turn up on doorsteps livestreaming, which puts innocent family members - including children - at risk, with absolutely no warning. I think some people just enjoy having power and inflicting humiliation, and are using protecting children as a cover to create nasty click bait. And I have no idea why people would want this stuff- it must be the same impulse which makes some people slow down to look at car crashes.

This was considered the case for my family friend. The first time he was put away many people were upset because it was “only” a fantasy about sleeping with a 12 year old child.

Any man happy to fantasise online about a sexual relationship with a child is a predator. I cannot see this any other way.

I really agree with this. Pass the evidence of the conversation to the police.

Not only that but by publicly streaming this it is going to make the real predators less likely to chat to underage people online ( ok that sounds good ) but instead they could do it through grooming - actually being in contact with underage children , befriending families etc … a way that is a lot less obvious and harder to prove and usually by the time it gets to a physical assault the victim is brainwashed and doesn’t believe they are being abused so harder to get away from.

If these traps were passed to the police at the point of conversation it wouldn’t be public knowledge - no paedophile is going to announce “ be careful fellow perverts , people are pretending to be children to lure us “ so surely that would be more effective , but no they crave the audience and the views .