Well, those are kids. We tend to forget how gullible, or easy to intimidate, we used to be at the age of 11 or twelve, I guess.

One thing which isn't clear from the information available is whether the "girl" concerned was originally genuine and then the situation was reported to the police and the detective took over, or was "she" a complete fake from the beginning, set up to catch paedophiles? If the latter, my worry is that with a good (i.e. clever, not moral) lawyer, he might be able to get found innocent on the technicality of entrapment.

I had a similar thought - is it juristically possible to sue someone for molesting a girl that never existed? I don't know about US law, and I suppose they had reasons enough -the stuff on his computer hard disk for example- to set up this trap to start with. But what about this special case?

[quote:d49aabc3ef="Hsing"]I had a similar thought - is it juristically possible to sue someone for molesting a girl that never existed? I don't know about US law, and I suppose they had reasons enough -the stuff on his computer hard disk for example- to set up this trap to start with. But what about this special case?[/quote:d49aabc3ef]Well, the [i:d49aabc3ef]intent[/i:d49aabc3ef] is there, so I don't see why not.

But could they prove the presence of anything on his hard disk until they raided him to catch him in the act?
There are laws being brought in under many jurisdictions to cover the practice of "grooming" of youngsters on the internet, but in this case I suspect that old laws/precedents about entrapment might get new evidence disallowed - despite any obvious intent - sometimes the law can be used to protect the guilty.

The article says that he "found the teenager's profile online". Mayhaps the girl does exist, but had turned her screenname over to the detectives once the conversation became sexual?

If so, she should get a reward. For various reasons.

[quote:583640b87d="drunkymonkey"][quote:583640b87d="Hsing"]I had a similar thought - is it juristically possible to sue someone for molesting a girl that never existed? I don't know about US law, and I suppose they had reasons enough -the stuff on his computer hard disk for example- to set up this trap to start with. But what about this special case?[/quote:583640b87d]Well, the [i:583640b87d]intent[/i:583640b87d] is there, so I don't see why not.[/quote:583640b87d]

No, you can't base a civil court case on intent. There have to be damages that can be given a monetary value.

edit: America and England have the same legal system (except for Louisiana, which uses the French system).

i'm not aware of any law enforcement agents doing it, but i know cyber vigalantes had great success rates with impersonating teens and getting pedopredators to give them their names and addresses.

i posted a link to a site about it on the old boards some time ago.

[quote:f3eba3e9cc="Marcia"][quote:f3eba3e9cc="drunkymonkey"][quote:f3eba3e9cc="Hsing"]I had a similar thought - is it juristically possible to sue someone for molesting a girl that never existed? I don't know about US law, and I suppose they had reasons enough -the stuff on his computer hard disk for example- to set up this trap to start with. But what about this special case?[/quote:f3eba3e9cc]Well, the [i:f3eba3e9cc]intent[/i:f3eba3e9cc] is there, so I don't see why not.[/quote:f3eba3e9cc]

No, you can't base a civil court case on intent. There have to be damages that can be given a monetary value.

edit: America and England have the same legal system (except for Louisiana, which uses the French system).[/quote:f3eba3e9cc]
I don't see why not really. It's going to stop him committing the real crime. I of course don't want some kind of Minority Report dystopia, but it's better to get someone before they commit a crime rather than after, surely?

[quote:361b61e62c="drunkymonkey"]but it's better to get someone before they commit a crime rather than after, surely?[/quote:361b61e62c]
That all depends on what the crime is... :cooler:

[quote:6d4a40e4c4="drunkymonkey"]but it's better to get someone before they commit a crime rather than after, surely?[/quote:6d4a40e4c4]

I can't remember which book it's in, but this was discussed in Discworld. You can arrest someone before they do a crime on a suspicion, but that would hardly hold up in court,

"We caught him before he did it."
"Did what?"
"Well, he hasn't done it yet..."

That only works with Doors. You can blame him even if he hasn't done it yet, because it IS his fault.

Katcal? remember what we said about overdoing an in-joke?

Yes Garner, sorry Garner, will probably do it again but not on purpose and will be sorry again Garner. :oops: