To Catch a Predator

To Catch a Predator is an American reality television series in the television news magazine program Dateline NBC. The program features confrontations by host Chris Hansen, partly filmed with a hidden camera, with adult men arriving at a sting house to have sex with a minor. The men are typically arrested as a result, with the minors being adults impersonating underage persons 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 Bill Conradt as police attempted to serve him with a search warrant after he was caught talking to and exchanging pictures with a Perverted-Justice volunteer posing as a 13-year-old boy. Conradt fatally shot himself as police and an NBC camera crew entered his home, an act that was captured by the filming crew. His estate sued Dateline for $105 million, then settled out of court. Hansen stated that To Catch a Predator ended because it had simply run its course, though he later ran a Kickstarter campaign to relaunch the series. In 2016, a spiritual successor program called Hansen vs. Predator became a recurring segment on Crime Watch Daily, a syndicated television news magazine hosted by Hansen. A second spiritual successor, Takedown with Chris Hansen, premiered in 2022 and currently airs on the TruBlu streaming network. Reruns of the Dateline...