Date: June 6, 2011
…”To catch a Predator” show. How on earth can that NOT be entrapment?”…
In a literal sense, of course…it is entrapment.
…Yet, in so many regards, politics and law enforcement have “many devils hidden in the details”.
“Honeypots” are a very similar issue. For anyone unaware, this is what they call it when law enforcement sets up a decoy [ie: a website offering “child porn” for sale], and then simply nabs all the people naive enough to hand over their credit card number. But, all they did was put it out there, and wait for people to seek it out.
The “Predator” series is different, as you noted…because there is a lot more factual enticement and encouragement going on…re-assurance, that there is another person on the other end of the chat, who honestly wants this.
My understanding, is that LEO themselves still cannot get away with doing that [the charges wont hold up in court]…but, it does not stop them from arresting and charging a suspect, in the event that they “witness a crime taking place”…Which is where we get into the fuzzy logic, of “intent to commit a crime”…For this purpose, they consider the mere fact that the person in question traveled to the agreed upon destination and entered the scene, as being the earliest portions of “a crime in progress”.
…and nothing stops the cops, from merely being around to witness such…even though, they know it might be likely to happen, given that two other groups have conspired to lure people to that scene.
It was not the cops who entrapped…it was “perverted justice” and “dateline nbc”…
If you watched the first couple of episodes of that ghastly series, then you know…there were no cops on the scene, originally…and the person who got caught on film and “interviewed”, was allowed to leave the scene on their own…but knowing they’d probably end up on television, and have their lives turned upside down.
Someone with nbc decided to start having a team of cops present at every episode shoot…and this led into unprecedented territory [legal, ethical and media/entertainment]…and a lot of criticism.
nbc did not listen, until they got their asses sued, bad…and a reasonably prominent person committed suicide…Then, they canceled the series.
I recall reading a news story, a year or so back…where the author was predicting that we [in the USA] would be loosing one of the big networks [cbs, nbc, abc, fox], because the “new market/economy” simply cannot support them all…and he picked nbc as the likely one to fall.
…Personally, I hope his words prove to be correct…
…May nbc crash and burn.
Diamond Raw: 002 June 21, 2011
Our Love Frontier 