Posted on 12/13/2006 6:53:03 AM PST by 68skylark
Thanks for giving your perspective. Perhaps I've just been way too sensitive about this topic.
Good photo -- thanks. That's a good movie.
It IS a thought crime ----UNTIL they show up on what they think is a youngster's doorstep carrying paraphernalia to engage in sex.
Under the law, carrying sex paraphernalia shows "intent" to commit acts against youngsters.
Hanson always reads from printouts messages the pervs sent wherein they acknowledge they KNOW the victim is underage. Some of the pervs also wire porn pics of themselves and their sexual organs, which is illegal.
Moreover, I believe the states used in the Dateline reports are chosen b/c they have specific laws that cover these areas.
A Lovely creature...by the way,she was great in the Boost. An old James Wood movie. Excellent movie!
That's been one of my concerns, in reality they weren't talking to a 14 year old girl, they were talking to a balding 50 year old guy. But as far as I know you can be prosecuted for buying a ziplock baggie of oregano if you "thought" it was mary jane. Something about one of the elements of a crime being a conscious act in furtherance of the criminal act. I think I read an example onece about a guy who read about bomb making, that in and of itself was not a crime, but when he started to purchase all of the components to build a bomb that was a "step" that was enough to arrest the guy. So these guys you see not only chatted away online, they also got into their cars and drove somewhere to further the criminal act. Maybe someone here with a better grasp of lawyer-speak could put it more eloquently.
It would be a lot more compelling if they'd show women soliciting sex from teen-age boys once in awhile. The Female solicitors out there have a free pass.
They did focus on military men - but also on teachers, people who worked with youth groups, and religious leaders. It made sense to me - those were the most egregious cases.
Yeah, this particular sting set-up is oriented to male perps, but it seems to me that female offenders get plenty of camera time on other news shows -- much more than males accused of similar crimes.
It seems like most people find female offenders more interesting, and somehow less repellent -- at least if they're good looking.
It's called the sin nature. When fed with little bits of self-indulgence here and there, it can balloon into a monster.
I think it's called "original sin." I'm not a very religious person, but that's about the best explanation I've heard for why people do bad things -- we're all flawed from the get-go.
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"We need professional law enforcement people to do these jobs, not a bunch of vigilantes. Vigilantism is always wrong...no matter how good their intentions."
Depends how you define vigilantism. If you mean dragging people out of a jail cell and "necklacing" them Africa style, you might have a point. Otherwise, I think you're flat out wrong. Our justice system initially operated with few if any professional police. The genesis of police departments was to assist citizens. Not to supplant them.
Like so many other things, those who were intended to assist have been handed over primary responsibility. And the end results are there for all to see. Research crime statistics from 150 years ago, in the years before police departments, and compare them to now. You'll find that we were far better off in the days before professional law enforcement.
I'm not advocating an end to professional law enforcement, but I'm sure as heck not going to agree with just passively standing back and letting them do their jobs. The proof is in the end results. We have more professional law enforcement officers today than you can shake a stick at and we still have crime rates that are a national scandal. Crime control is just another one of those things where if you want it done right, you'd better plan on doing it yourself. I say give law enforcement back to the people where it belongs. Professional police can certainly help out, but they aren't any more a cure for crime than government schools are a cure for illiteracy.
"It should make at least some pedophiles think twice and make some of the parents who seemed to be in denial to realize the dangers involved in the Internet."
This is an effective and low cost deterrent. I really like it. A few scumbags get caught, many more get sent a clear message, and it doesn't cost me a dime in added taxes to set up the sting.
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