You might remember a show called To Catch a Predator that aired on NBC in the 2000s, hosted by Chris Hansen.
Well, recently, Reddit user u/BreakupSimulatorLite asked "Redditors who knew men caught on To Catch a Predator before the show, what were they like?"
The most horrifying yet impactful theme of the responses is that predators can be anyone — read on to see the stories.
NOTE: This post is about child abuse and child sex crimes.
1. "I knew the cop from Alabama that was arrested on the show. He had guns and rope in his vehicle when he went to meet the girl. Super creepy stuff. When he was a sheriff’s deputy in Florida, he would come into my job frequently. So, I didn’t know him on a personal level, but I did talk to him on a regular basis. He was a really nice, respectful guy; he seemed to be a good cop, too. I was SHOCKED when I saw the episode. You never really know what goes on in someone’s bedroom."
2. "My husband worked with/was good friends with one of the men on the first ever episode. We were all in our late twenties. He was a highly educated, well-liked guy. He was nice and funny as hell. We were all shocked. He got busted trying to sleep with a 12- or 14-year-old girl."
3. "My boss at my old job — cool dude. Probably widely known as one of the best supervisors on the job. Knew everyone’s strengths and weaknesses and where to put them to best utilize them. Kind of guy to buy everyone a round of drinks. Always invited people to barbecues at his house. Shit rocked everyone's world when it happened."
4. "I was best friends with Roberto Forte’s son when I was in elementary/middle school. He (Roberto) was a native Italian and was always extremely friendly. I don’t remember anything that made me think that he would be capable of anything like the stuff he was caught doing. Had plenty of sleepovers at this house, too. Just remember a ton of good food and memories with his son."
5. "He was in my class for a few years in high school. Cody Green was his name. ... He always wore the same few outfits, super baggy pants and an overly large white hat. I always felt kind of bad for him because it seemed like he came from some messed up ... home, but he was also creepy and weird towards the girls who would give him attention because they felt bad, too. He’d walk by girls and do the 'accidental brush up' thing but really he was grabbing their asses. He was just a weird dude."
6. "Was someone from my hometown in NY. Went to school with their younger sister. After he graduated high school, he did everything he could to hang out with much younger kids. Always wanted to buy booze for us or roll up a joint and smoke us out in his van."
7. "I didn't know the guy before the show, but after. Over a decade ago, I was on a dating website and was talking to a guy that claimed to be a doctor. I thought it was very unusual that this doctor had so much free time throughout the day to text me so frequently. [He] was begging me to meet up with him and telling me he'd shower me with all these gifts."
8. "Yes, Matty Nash. He was creepy and kept trying to get me to go to Burning Man. When I told him I didn't think that was a good idea because I had a 10-year-old kid at the time, he said I should bring my kid. Now, I don't think he was interested in my kid at all, but I did tell him I thought that would be super creepy to bring a kid to Burning Man with a bunch of people on E. This was in 2001. He came over to my house under the guise of talking business and then put the moves on me. I turned him down and sent him home to his wife."
9. "I went to school with Robb Kline. From what I can remember ... he was quiet and kept to himself. He never did anything to label himself a creep."
10. "He legit was always trying to sleep with men that were way too young for him (albeit just barely legal) and we made jokes all the time to him about how he was going to wind up on that show. We literally called him Herbert. It was the opposite of a 'he was the last person I would suspect' situation."
11. "I was one dude's RA in university. He was a seriously weird dude, but was relatively friendly, came out to all of the campus events, and was not suspected of being a predator at all by any of us in the dorms back in those days. He was busted on To Catch a Predator about 2–3 years after I graduated, so probably sometime 2003–2005."
12. "I served with Steve Buchanan before he got out the service. In the show, he goes on talking about how deployment changed him and throws a pity party for himself. The reality is he never deployed — he just said he did to try and get sympathy. He was also a mechanic, so if he did deploy with us, he would have very seldom left base. As for what he was like, he had a creepy-ass vibe to him."
13. "I knew him from physics classes, nothing else. I remember we were in the same lab group, so we were spending 3–4 hours at a time working on some lab project. He was an immigrant from India and a rather small man, very thin and fairly short.... [He] was the type of guy who had no luck with girls (like zero), which is really common for a lot of dudes at this age."
14. "One of my high school classmates was on the show. In high school, he was actually one of the more popular kids. Kind of one of those funny asshole guys, but [he] wasn’t a bully. He played sports [and] was on the lacrosse team with me. He did drink and smoke. My mom and his mom were pretty close. Honestly, he...seemed relatively normal. A few years later, he had the privilege of meeting Chris Hansen."
15. "Very short, skinny man; curly hair; appeared aged beyond his years. I don’t remember his name — don’t want to. I was his supervisor in a dirty, old factory in Cleveland. When he was in training, it came to light that he wasn’t strong enough to cut the steel wire in my department. That usually meant he would be let go. But his work ethic was like nothing I’d ever seen — I remember watching him sweep the floor like a man possessed. So I talked to HR and got him transferred to another dept."
16. "It was my best friend's dad. I slept over there all the time as a kid and hung out. He was relatively normal, to be honest. Worked a lot. My friend and I recall getting on their home computer when we were younger and there were pictures of trips to Thailand and it looked like he was at some strip club. The strippers looked like children, but we didn’t think anything of it because we were kids and figured the women looked younger in Thailand. They ended up moving out to California and he got caught on the show during my junior year of college. He called my family and all of the other families to explain that he never did anything to us. As far as I know, he didn’t."
17. "I didn’t know the person directly, but I worked at a company that had a freelancer caught on the show. This was particularly problematic, as the company was Nickelodeon Animation (a popular kid's channel). Everyone who knew the guy was actually pretty shocked. It was particularly rough for his girlfriend at the time, as she also worked at the studio, so there was no hiding from it."
18. "Rabbi David Kaye was my rabbi temporarily when I was a kid. He was a dick and used to scream at us for mundane things, especially the boys. He had been fired and moved away when he was on To Catch a Predator. Fucker deserves to rot."
19. "I was underage at the time and met John [Kennelly] through a community kinda thing. He seemed okay; [he] kept trying to persuade my parents to allow me to go over to his place, though. I could always tell something seemed off. Thankfully, [I] dodged a bullet there."
20. "I went to school with a guy that was arrested via To Catch a Predator. He didn't get a full-on segment on the show, but he was shown in one of the arrest montages. ... He was 100% a mega creeper. I had a team project with him and went to his place and he had porn pictures printed out and laminated covering his walls."
21. And finally..."Strange dude. Always a little bit of a different thinker, always just slightly out of step with the mainstream. [He] had a tough time in school; got picked on a lot. Extremely bright, became a lawyer, worked a ton on left-wing causes. Never quite shed his awkwardness, always seemed apart somehow. Nonetheless, he was a friend, or a friendly acquaintance, anyway. Everyone was stunned when he was exposed. No one ever suspected him. He was weird, but so are lots of people."
