Peadophile Hunters

In the UK alone, over 150 hunting teams were collectively responsible for 1,148 citizen arrest confrontations with suspected paedophiles in 2021.

In the US, a child is sexually assaulted every nine minutes. In the UK, this figure is closer to one every seven minutes

Professor Mark de Rond, Cambridge Judge Business School.

Preface

Paedophile hunters and their teams are a self-regulated, self-funded civilian force operating within the United Kingdom. Police forces have many concerns, not only about the legal conduct of hunters, but the aftermath of ramifications hunters and teams leave behind them. Since the COVID-19 lockdown, police forces have been described as "overwhelmed" with the rise in online child abuse, leading civilians to group together to diminish a very real threat untoward the psychological health of our nations children.

Over the last year, I have psychoanalysed hundreds of paedophile sting operation reels uploaded / live-streamed onto social media platform Facebook. Not only is the psychological causation of this grotesque epidemic of primary concern; but also psychological damage inflicted by vengeful hunter sting operations during humiliating and sometimes violent detainments within sometimes lengthy durations of citizen arrest. I have no personal axe to grind with hunting teams, this is a psychoanalytical examination behind hunters and their teams character of conduct.

Within this paper, I provided a brief description of the history of paedophile hunter teams, an overview of the common law legality of their sting operations. Many hunters have suffered from child abuse themselves, but to exert psychological damage onto suspected paedophiles (innocent until proven guilty in a court of law) is not within the remit of citizen arrest or legalised punishment laid out by laws and courts of this land; that they claim to enforce as representives enabling an overworked police force.

History

To Catch a Predator is an American reality television series in the television news magazine program Dateline NBC featuring confrontations with host Chris Hansen, partly filmed with a hidden camera, of adult men arriving at a sting house to have sex with a minor and typically being arrested as a result. The minors are adults impersonating underage persons (generally ages 12 or 13) in online chats. The series premiered in November 2004.

It followed twelve undercover sting operations as they were conducted across the United States with the watchdog group Perverted-Justice. Following the third investigation, law enforcement and other officials became involved, leading to the arrests of most individuals caught. Upon its airing, the series received mixed reactions for its sordid tone, and the ethical and legal concerns raised over the nature of the sting operations it depicted, in particular potential violations of entrapment laws.

The show was cancelled in 2008, following the suicide of Rockwall County, Texas assistant district attorney Louis Conradt, as police attempted to serve him with a search warrant after he had been caught talking to and exchanging pictures with a Perverted-Justice volunteer posing as a 13-year-old boy. Conradt fatally shot himself shot himself with a Browning .380 pistol as police and an NBC camera crew entered his home, an act that was captured by the filming crew. His estate sued Dateline for US$105 million, then settled out of court.

“Conradt no doubt knew that statute 33.021 in the Texas penal code description of the crime of "online solicitation of a minor" states that an adult offends when he "communicates in a sexually explicit manner with a minor," and defines "minor" as anyone who represents himself or herself as being under the age of seventeen.”

Luke Dittrich, Esquire

NBC personnel photographed and videotaped Conradt's body and gun, and they obtained an audiotape of his last words: "I am not gonna hurt anybody.". One of the officers on the scene mugged for a Dateline camera and opined, "That'll make good TV.". Conradt was airlifted by CareFlite to Dallas' Parkland Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. ABC's 20/20 reported on the Conradt case to illustrate the fraught possibilities when news media and police work too closely together: Murphy police received some of their instruction from Dateline personnel, dramatic footage superseded police procedure, and both NBC employees and Perverted-Justice volunteers were "deeply involved in the operation."

In late 2018, Perverted-Justice announced that, from the beginning of 2019, they would be formally ending decoy operations, and effectively cease all other operations afterwards. They also announced that they would be converting the official website to an archive of past operations and collected data, and removing other site features such as the forums. The data they proposed to compile and make accessible on the website, including thousands of formerly unseen chat logs, is available for research purposes in order to assist anti-pedophile groups and law enforcement with regard to understanding the behavior and techniques of online pedophiles.

Epidemic

The number of paedophiles who pose a threat has almost tripled admist isolation of 2021 COVID19 lockdown. Shock figures from the National Crime Agency (NCA) show the estimated number of UK child sex offenders has risen from 300,000, almost tripling the previous year of 2020. Officials estimated between 550,000 and 850,000 suspects in the UK – which included paedophiles who download and share images as well as those involved in direct physical abuse.

The NCA in its National Strategic Assessment said the rise was due to an increase in child pornography users during the pandemic combined with more children going online as schools shut.

In the last year, more children were safeguarded than ever before, with nearly 10,000 children identified by police and the National Crime Agency in the first nine months of 2020/21 and more than 7,000 suspects arrested. The report says child sexual abuse in the UK is increasing: "The assessment concludes that despite significant operational and policy responses, the child sexual abuse threat continues to grow, exacerbated by rising online activity.".

“During the pandemic, the internet was a lifeline. But we are only now unpacking the full effects. What is clear to us is that younger children are being pulled into abusive situations by rapacious predators, often while they are in their own bedrooms. Their parents are often unaware there is this online backdoor into their homes which is leaving their children vulnerable. I fear this could be the tip of the iceberg.”

Susie Hargreaves OBE, Chief Executive of the IWF.

In 2021/22, there were 6,156 Sexual Communication with a Child offences, an increase on the previous year and almost 120 offences per week on average. NSPCC research also revealed:

Data published by the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) shows in 2022, 63,050 reports related to imagery which had been created of children aged 7-10 who, in many cases, had been groomed, coerced, or tricked into performing sexual acts on camera by an online predator. This is a 129 per cent increase on the 27,550 reports in this category in 2021. The 2022 figures are a 1,058 per cent increase on the 5,443 such reports in 2019 before the outbreak of Coronavirus.

Legality

Pedophilia is not a legal term, as having a sexual attraction to children without acting on it is not illegal. In law enforcement circles, the term pedophile is sometimes used informally to refer to any person who commits one or more sexually-based crimes that relate to legally underage victims. These crimes may include child sexual abuse, statutory rape, offenses involving child pornography, child grooming, stalking, and indecent exposure.

Citizen Arrest

A citizen's arrest is an arrest made by a private citizen – that is, a person who is not acting as a sworn law-enforcement official. In common law jurisdictions, the practice dates back to medieval England and the English common law, in which sheriffs encouraged ordinary citizens to help apprehend law breakers.

In England and Wales, the power comes from Section 24A(2) of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE), called "any person arrest"; this legislation states "any person" has these powers. The aim of PACE is to establish a balance between the powers of the police in England and Wales and the rights and freedoms of the public.

The act states that you can arrest somebody to prevent them from:

  1. Causing physical injury to themselves or someone else.
  2. Suffering a physical injury.
  3. Causing loss or damage to property.
  4. Attempting to escape before a Police officer is able to assume responsibility of them.

A citizen's arrest can be lawfully carried out on any person for an indictable offence, including either way offences. Where an arrest is made after an offence has been committed, the person who makes the arrest must actually know, not simply suspect that an offence has actually been committed. If it later turns out that an offence had not been committed, such an arrest would be unlawful.

Anyone citizen attempting such an arrest should also inform the subject of what is being done doing as soon as is reasonably possible, explaining the reason for arresting them, and what offence it is believed that they have committed.

In the UK there is no specific definition of ‘reasonable force’ as it depends on what is deemed necessary under the individual circumstance. However, guidance from the Crown Prosecution Service states that “If you only did what you honestly thought was necessary at the time, this would provide strong evidence that you acted within the law.”.

Using reasonable force a citizen can:

  1. Protect yourself ‘in the heat of the moment’ – this includes using an object as a weapon
  2. Stop an intruder running off – for example by tackling them to the ground

However, a citizen could be prosecuted if, for example, they:

  1. Attack the individual even if you’re no longer in danger
  2. Pre-plan a trap for someone – rather than involve the police

"Any person" powers can be used to arrest before an offence occurs as long as the offence in question falls within the Criminal Attempts Act 1981. This act creates the offence of an attempted offence, as long as the offence being attempted is an indictable. For this to apply, the offence must actually be in the process of being attempted—preparatory steps are not sufficient.

Although a person cannot make a citizen's arrest before an offence takes place, they may use the power provided section 3 of the Criminal Law Act 1967 to use reasonable force for the prevention of crime. This would not allow a citizen's arrest before an offence takes place in this sense but would allow any person to use reasonable force to prevent an offence from occurring.

Detainment

However, citizens do not have the same powers as police officers. Therefore, citizens are not permitted to detain a person for a prolonged period of time. If they do this, they may be guilty of false imprisonment. The definition of false imprisonment under UK law and legislation is the "Unlawful imposition or constraint of another's freedom of movement from a particular place.". 'Imprisonment is, as I apprehend, a total restraint of the liberty of the person, for however, short a time, and not a partial obstruction of his will, whatever inconvenience it may bring on him.

“Any restraint of the liberty of a free man will be an imprisonment.”.

Lord Denman CJ.

In March 2023 peadophile hunters Sam Miller of Hutton Court, Anfield Plain, Stanley, James Moss of Laburnum Avenue, Blyth, Iain McCutcheon of Roseberry Villas, Newfield, Chester-le-Street, and Craig Carter of Elm Street, Chester-le-Street, from a group named Child Online Safety Team (COST) appeared for trial at Newcastle Crown Court where they each faced a charge of false imprisonment.

Sam Miller stinging Keith Watson - Derby. Filming someone in a private setting without consent maybe illegal and a breach of Section 1, Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Sam Miller was found guilty by a jury of one count of false imprisonment and sentenced at Newcastle Crown Court to nine months in prison. Another member of the group, James Moss was also convicted of false imprisonment. The judge told Moss: "Like Mr Miller, you do not appear to have any regard for the police and criminal justice system." She accepted that he had a lesser role and had acted, as he had described it, as security. During their sentencing hearing on Friday, Judge Julie Clemitson said:

“He was kept in that same position for more than 14 minutes. He repeatedly asked for he torch to be turned off and for you not to film him. He was told he had lost the privilege to even stand up. You wrongly said he had been convicted of rape. Your actions made towards him were clearly designed to cause maximum humiliation and distress. He had no rights at all, as far as you were concerned.”.

The judge told the court how the group were unlicensed civilians who have no greater authority than any other member of the public. She said more force than needed had been used to carry out a citizen's arrest on the man. Following the incident, the jury was told that in April 2020, Miller received a cease and desist letter from North Yorkshire Police saying his actions were putting children at risk and that he was potentially committing offences and hindering ongoing police investigations. The letter told him to "stop what you are doing".

“Peter Eguae, defending Moss, told the court: 'To act outside the protection of the law certainly was not his intention. He will not be a vigilante again. He has learned a sad, long and valuable lesson.”.

Gordon Carse, defending Miller, told the court how he suffers from ADHD as well as anxiety and depression. He said he cares for his elderly grandmother and his dad has a terminal illness. Mr Carse urged the judge to hand him a suspended prison sentence. He said: "If there's a custodial sentence given today, given that, as I understand it, his father has been given about six months to live, he would be less likely to see his father in his remaining days." The court heard how Miller had a number of previous convictions which include impersonating a police officer, common assault 2012 and violent disorder on Derby Day in 2013, for which he was locked up for 16 months.

However, Millers sentence for one count of false imprisonment was later rescinded by Judge Julie Clemitson after it was found that Miller had not stepped away from working with COST at all, and appeared to be actively still involved with the group. Miller was then hauled back to the court and appeared on Monday to be re-sentenced, where he was given a 10-month prison sentence. Re-sentencing Miller, Judge Clemitson said he had "no regard for the criminal justice system at all" and that he has an "over-inflated sense of self-importance". She said Miller also enjoyed the "thrill of being a hero". Child Online Safety Team (COST) currently operates as Newcastle Hunters.

Predator Exposure were accused of "overstepping the mark" when they took part in online chats with other group members posing as teenagers. Six members of the group went on trial accused of charges including false imprisonment and common assault at Leeds Crown Court. During the trial, jurors were told that members had detained and verbally abused two men and used unnecessary force against one, who was allegedly put in a headlock and dragged out of a shop against his will. Philip Hoban of Beeston, Leeds, an ex MMA fighter who set up the group in 2017 with his 19-year-old son Jordan McDonald, from Farnley was found not guilty. Hoban lit a thick cigar to cheers from supporters, and said:

Philip Hoban pictured centre (7th from left) right of Bjorn from team StopUK, amongst other hunters.

“We are here today to celebrate what we're doing. Thank you to everybody for all your support, it's amazing. We're all not guilty. Today, we are going to celebrate and this is just the start. We will be back very soon, tune in people.”.

In August 2018, four of the defendants had gone to a home in Normanton, West Yorkshire, to confront a man who had talked online with a Predator Exposure member posing as a 14-year-old, the court heard. The man, who had been diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder as a child and is believed to be on the autistic spectrum, was prevented from leaving his back garden and going inside his home to get his medication, and was left "extremely scared and upset". Another man was confronted by five of the defendants in the Chapel Allerton area of Leeds. He was chased to a nearby shop, where some members of the group attempted to physically drag him outside to make a citizen's arrest, the jury heard.

Teams

Dark Justice (founded on 30 October 2014) were a group operation set up to catch paedophiles based in Newcastle upon Tyne operated by two men using the pseudonyms Scott (born 1991) and Callum (1994–2021). Neither were police officers, although their tactics were similar to those sometimes used by police. The duo posed online as children, normally between the ages of 11 and 15, in order to catch online child groomers. During 2017, an anonymous businessman gave Dark Justice an office in Newcastle to serve as the group's new base of operations.

Whilst the police do not directly collaborate with Child Online Safety Team in evidence gathering, the information gathered these teams is frequently relied upon in criminal trials.

Their evidence was used in court, resulting in convictions against over 115 online groomers. In May 2018, the Evening Chronicle reported that Dark Justice have secured over 150 arrests with over 40 of those being jailed. In 2019, a landmark ruling was passed meaning that online groomers would now face the same sentence regardless of whether or not the child they attempted to meet was real. In April 2021, Scott announced that Callum had died in a "tragic accident" and that the organisation would cease operating.

In 2017, it was ruled that ‘there was no legal requirement for the activities of such groups to be subject to controls’ (Perraudin, 2017) after legal teams acting for two men caught by the cyber-vigilante group Dark Justice argued that such operations ‘diminished the integrity of the court process’. The human rights argument still, however, bears credence. Research in this area has argued that ‘the investigatory practices of paedophile hunters are antithetical to numerous core values and functions of the criminal justice system’.

Hunters

Shane Brannigan is considered by many teams to be the "legendary godfather" of peadophile hunters. Brannigan conducted stings operations for his organisation; informally known as the "N*nce Haters' Association". Brannigan Social Care Investigations LTD nature of business was registered as investigation activities by Brannigan (registering his occupation as a Private Investigator) with Companies House 12316363 during November 2019, this Private limited Company was dissolved in June 2021. Brannigan has account on Facebook, reactived from suspension after three years he claims.

Brannigan's Facebook profile. Snapshot taken 21:29 7/10/23
Brannigan's Facebook feed. Snapshot taken 21:30 7/10/23.

During August 2019 Brannigan slammed authorities for taking him to court after he was cleared of holding a child sex offender against his will. Brannigan, had been on trial for the false imprisonment of Bournemouth man Andrew Vaughan, who had been caught sending lewd messages to children. During the trial it was alleged that Mr Brannigan carried out a ‘Wild West-style’ citizen’s arrest of Mr Vaughan who he had caught in a sting operation. The trial, which lasted three days, the court heard that Mr Brannigan was an ‘anti-authoritarian’ who ‘hated the police’.

Bronco.

While police broadly welcome citizen involvement in fighting crime, they think hunters unhelpful, even given the role of the evidence they collect. The police accuse hunters of acting on insufficiently robust evidence and jeopardising ongoing investigations. They also say hunters fail to safeguard suspects with learning difficulties who may prove difficult to prosecute, nor do they take sufficient action to protect suspects and their families from reprisals by neighbours and psychological injury.

“I can’t deny [the work of paedophile hunters has] led to convictions, but they’ve also led to people being blackmailed, people being subject of GBH (grievous bodily harm), the wrong people being accused, people committing suicide as a result of interventions, family lives being completely destroyed, in the name of what? Facebook likes.”.

Police Ch Con Simon Bailey, National Police Chief's Council Press Association, 2019.

Bailey’s views continued to be upheld in 2020 as a spokesman for North Yorkshire Police stated, in response to a local sting:

“ The police service does not endorse Online Child Abuse Activist Groups and will not work with them. Unlike our highly-trained officers in the Online Abuse & Exploitation Team and the Digital Forensics Unit, they operate without any procedures to keep people safe. Accused people can become vulnerable to self-harm and there are cases around the country of people committing suicide.”.

Gray, 2020.

The policing of child sexual predators by citizen groups outside of law enforcement has evoked a range of responses among media commentators and the general public. Bailey, the national policing lead on child abuse investigation, said so-called paedophile hunters were “taking risks they don’t understand”; countering hunters – who reject the term vigilante – say that in private police are supportive of their work and provide advice. They argue that they simply gather evidence and never seek to mete out punishment.

Decoys

Pretending to be children online, decoys wait for predators to initiate sexual communications. When predators ignore reminders that they are talking to “children”, hunters expose them in livestreamed “stings” once they have sufficient evidence of grooming provided by the decoy(s). Civil entrapment to commit a crime (also called ‘private entrapment’) happens, for example, when decoys pose online as a child and subsequently persuade a target to send them an image of a child that it is illegal to make, to possess, or to distribute. Depending on the jurisdiction, such persuasion could be illegal.

Decoys are unlikely to be agents of a regulated covert operation, and they might not be legally permitted to have indecent images of children on their devices. In England and Wales, this, at least in principle, could lead to a charge of ‘making’ or of ‘possessing’ indecent images of children. In addition, citizens do not have the same investigative powers as police. For example, hacking a suspected paedophile’s Internet accounts would be illegal if it were done by a citizen, though it maybe lawful if it were done by a police officer with a warrant.

While there is disagreement as to what, if anything, is wrong with legal entrapment, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has ruled that it breaches Article 6.1 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) in respect of the defendant’s right to a fair trial. The ECtHR sees this right as relevant to the criminal investigation, not only to court proceedings. This shifts the emphasis away from the implications for the state or how it is regarded by the public, and towards the rights of the accused.

What kind of activity by decoy would be entrapment? Putting a fake profile, containing no sexually suggestive content, online would not count: this is mere presentation of an opportunity. If the investigator is the one to turn an online chat with a potential target sexual, to suggest a meeting, or to request the sending of an indecent image, then that conduct involves entrapment rather than the mere presentation of an opportunity, since the investigator is actively suggesting that an offence be committed. This is a line that some decoys cross (Gillespie 2019).

More generally, a legislative response to both decoys and hunters might be required. Gillespie (2019) makes this suggestion in relation to whether the courts should work with the evidence gathered by decoys. Legislation might instead, or also, restrict hunters’ activities by debarring them from confronting, detaining and prematurely exposing their quarry. To tackle both child abuse and paedophile hunting, Jim Gamble has proposed the criminalisation of posing online as a child.

Stings

Live Streaming

Peadophiles

Pedophilia is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children. Although girls typically begin the process of puberty at age 10 or 11, and boys at age 11 or 12, psychiatric diagnostic criteria for pedophilia extend the cut-off point for prepubescence to age 13.

Pedophilia was first formally recognised and named in the late 19th century. A significant amount of research in the area has taken place since the 1980s. Although mostly documented in men, there are also women who exhibit the disorder. The exact causes of pedophilia have not been conclusively established. Some studies of pedophilia in child sex offenders have correlated it with various neurological abnormalities and psychological pathologies.

Predator Mark Newell, Bradford, came to meet a thirteen year old girl; stung by TOOK and Save the Children Online.

Studies of pedophilia in child sex offenders often report that it co-occurs with other psychopathologies, such as low self-esteem, depression, anxiety, and personality problems. It is not clear whether these are features of the disorder itself, artifacts of sampling bias, or consequences of being identified as a sex offender. Impaired self-concept and interpersonal functioning were reported in a sample of child sex offenders who met the diagnostic criteria for pedophilia by Cohen et al. (2002), which the authors suggested could contribute to motivation for pedophilic acts.

Predator stung by Baz Neil of Bolton team Elite Predator Interceptors.

The pedophilic offenders in the study had elevated psychopathy and cognitive distortions compared to healthy community controls. This was interpreted as underlying their failure to inhibit their criminal behavior. Studies in 2009 and 2012 found that non-pedophilic child sex offenders exhibited psychopathy, but pedophiles did not.

Sexual Grooming

Sexual grooming refers to actions or behaviors used to establish an emotional connection with a minor, and sometimes the child's family, to lower the child's inhibitions with the objective of sexual abuse. It can occur in various settings, including online, in person, and through other means of communication.

Sting, Protecting kids Scotland.

During the 1990s, the term grooming began to replace seduction as the most commonly used term. However, there was not "one official, legal, mental health, or even lay definition" of grooming. Growing awareness of chat rooms being used by pedophiles to target victims came to public notice, and the use of 'grooming' to mean "To win the confidence of (a victim) in order to a commit sexual assault on him or her" became mainstream.

Some abusers (sometimes posing as children themselves) chat with children online and make arrangements to meet with them in person. Online grooming of minors is most prevalent in relation to the 13–17 age group (99% of cases), and particularly 13–14 (48%). The majority of targeted children are girls, and most victimisation occurs with mobile-phone support.

Facebook hacked, again Predator stung by STOP.

Internet-facilitated crimes against minors involve deceit and begin with adults communicating with children over the Internet with the goal of coercing them into illegal sexual activity. Sometimes the sexual abuse happens face to face. Chat rooms, instant messaging, Internet forums, social networking sites, cell phones, and even video game consoles have issues with online predations.

These online areas attract predators because they allow them to have access to make contact with victims without drawing attention. The anonymity of online conversations leads to the disinhibition of minors, making them feel more comfortable and more likely to engage in risky behaviors. This allows predators to use manipulation to put their targets into situations where they will comply with the predator's sexual demands.

Initial manipulation often involves introducing the minors to sexual activity, showing them pornography, and requesting sexually explicit information and pictures. This online predatory behavior does not often lead to actual or attempted offline contact, but it could. Minors are usually complicit with perpetrators often using promises of love and romance to seduce victims to meet.

Abusers may control their victims with a range of tactics, including, but not limited to:

  1. Positive reinforcement - such as praise, superficial charm, flattery, ingratiation, love bombing.
  2. Negative reinforcement - taking away aversive tasks or items), intermittent or partial reinforcement.
  3. Psychological punishment - such as silent treatment, threats, intimidation, emotional blackmail, guilt trips and traumatic tactics (such as verbal abuse or explosive anger).

Abusive power and control is a pattern of domination through which the abuser uses coercive and controlling tactics, which may or may not involve physical, psychological, or sexual violence, to entrap their victim. The primary outcome of coercive control is a condition of entrapment that can be hostage-like in the harms it inflicts on dignity, liberty, autonomy and personhood as well as physical and psychological integrity".

Victims

Children who are groomed may experience mental health issues, including "anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress, and suicidal thoughts.". Children who are groomed may feel they are to blame for their abuse, and have difficulty placing blame on the perpetrator. Nearly 75 percent of victims who met offenders face-to-face did so more than once.

Most of these offenders are charged with crimes such as statutory rape for non-forcible sexual contact as the victims are, by law, too young to consent. The youth most vulnerable to online sex offenders often have histories of sexual or physical abuse, family problems, and tendencies to take risks both on- and offline.

The vulnerabilities of the victim are exploited, with those who are particularly vulnerable being most often selected as targets. Traumatic bonding can occur between abusers and victims as the result of ongoing cycles of abuse in which the intermittent reinforcement of reward and punishment creates powerful emotional bonds (that are resistant to change) and a climate of fear.

Child grooming, has a lifelong impact on children and has short and long-term consequences on a child’s life regardless if the grooming occurred in person or online. These negative effects include:

False Accusation

Whilst many peadophile hunting teams boast 100% conviction rates, some even alleging they never get it wrong, innoncent people have wrongly been targeted by peadophile hunters. An innocent couple from Dumbarton were wrongly targeted by paedophile hunters and forced to flee their home after angry mob of 300 vigilantes descended on their property. Fireworks and bricks were launched at the windows of David McLean's home in Dumbarton, after an angry crowd gathered outside because a social media post wrongly branded him a paedophile. Mr McLean, 37, and his partner Shona, 35, were left fearing for their safety inside their house in February this year, while rioters live streamed the violence on TikTok.

“We were terrified, absolutely terrified. People were outside chanting 'dirty beast' and the crowd just got bigger, bigger and bigger. The police tried to get us out at the start, but the crowd gathered so quickly it wasn't safe to move us. We spent two hours inside listening to all of that. Fireworks and boulders were being thrown at the house. Cars were being kicked and smashed.”.

Shona, Daily Record, 12th May 2023
Dumbarton Riots.

“The safety of residents and police officers is of the utmost importance. When large-scale vigilante incidents like this happen, it diverts police away from emergencies, which should be the last thing anyone wants to happen. There is no excuse for false information being circulated online. I am hopeful that the Online Safety Bill which is currently going through the House of Commons will help bring an end to this and give more responsibility to social media firms to take action against those who post malicious information online.”.

Jackie Baillie, MSP Dumbarton.

Police reports have confirmed that Mr McLean is not on the sex offenders register and has never been charged with any sexual offence, the Daily Record reported. The origins of the incident date back to 2018 when peadophile hunter group Exposed Britain wrongfully named him as a sex offender in a Facebook post. The post is understood to have resurfaced and triggered the riot. Police Scotland confirmed the incident was caused by inaccurate information circulating online. Area Commander Chief Inspector Ryan McMurdo described the scenes at the riot as 'unacceptable'.

Punishment

In England and Wales, sections 14 and 15 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 make it an offence to arrange a meeting with a child under 16, for oneself or someone else, with the intent of sexually abusing the child. The meeting itself is also an offence in its own right. The offence carries a maximum sentence of 10 years imprisonment and automatic barring of the offender from working with children or vulnerable adults. Thus, a crime may be committed even without the actual meeting taking place and without the child being involved in the meeting.