Dateline to catch a predator series#

In a mordant footnote to the tragedy, Dittrich reports that because of various problems, including crime venue problems and the lack of proper warrants, the county's district attorney was unable to prosecute any of the 23 men arrested in Murphy during the Texas 'Dateline' encampment. The last footage shot was of the SWAT team loading Conradt's body into the ambulance. When the man, a former district attorney named Bill Conradt Jr., failed to show up at the trysting house as arranged, Esquire shows, NBC pressed police to obtain a warrant for his arrest and force a confrontation at his own home. (Esquire, like The Chronicle, is a Hearst publication.) In telling the story of a Dateline 'Predator' operation that ended in a man's suicide by gunshot when the police stormed his house with NBC's cameras poised outside, writer Luke Dittrich portrays a network hungry for real-life drama at any cost and a Murphy, Texas, police department only too avid to play along. Contrary to the network's claim of 'parallel investigations' with police, she says, 'Dateline' pays or otherwise reimburses law enforcement officials, trades its video services for information and for dramatically staged arrests, and illegally provides video feeds to prosecutors.Ī piece in the forthcoming September Esquire turns the spotlight on the problem in graphic and grim detail. Former 'Dateline' anchor Stone Phillips has said that in many of the contrived Internet chats, 'the decoy is the first to bring up the subject of sex.' Bartel's assertions about the relationship between NBC and law enforcement are more disturbing. Among other things, Bartel argues that paying Perverted Justice for its services gives the group 'a financial incentive to lie to and trick targets of its sting.' She's not the only ex-employee, incidentally, to discuss the show's underlying methods.

Dateline to catch a predator series#

In May, in a wrongful dismissal lawsuit filed by a former 'Dateline' employee, Marsha Bartel outlined a series of ethical misgivings about 'To Catch a Predator' that some media critics have raised themselves. The program also freely hands over its videotapes to prosecutors. At least one suspect who didn't show up for the arranged meeting killed himself as cops and Dateline moved in to seize him at his home instead.Īccording to the Chronicle article, NBC pays Perverted Justice for its work and also pays or reimburses cops who participate in the episodes.

'To Catch a Predator' relies on the work of anonymous members of a group that calls itself Perverted Justice who pose online as underage children to lure pedophiles and others into online sexual chats with 'minors' and set up meetings with them at locations where Dateline cameras can swoop in to catch them on tape.

If you don't have time to read the whole article, the San Francisco Chronicle also has a story out today listing some of those ethical issues.

Apropos to my earlier DefCon story about the NBC Dateline producer who was caught at the hacker conference with a hidden camera in her purse trying to 'Catch a Hacker,' Esquire magazine has an exposé in its September issue that looks at ethical issues around Dateline's ratings-magnet series, 'To Catch a Predator.' (You can also read a transcript of the Esquire writer's contentious interview with 'Catch a Predator' host, Chris Hansen.)