Police laud impact of sex sting

The sexual predator sting in which 29 men were arrested at a Petaluma home in 2006 has been successful in helping to keep predators away from the area, says the police lieutenant who helped to implement the operation.

“Sexual predators are a reality in our society, and we’re very interested in combating their crimes. We have been able to verify that the 2006 operation certainly has put Petaluma on the map, in the eyes of people who patrol the Internet for these purposes,” said Lt. Matthew Stapleton of the Petaluma Police Department.

The operation, which took place Aug. 25-27 at a home on Castle Drive, was implemented not because of any rash of sexual predator incidents in the area. Rather, it was designed to prevent such incidents from occurring in Petaluma, particularly because of the growing number of Internet-predator cases in the country, in general.

Petaluma police and other law-enforcement agencies — along with the online watchdog group, Perverted Justice, and the Dateline NBC-TV show, “To Catch a Predator” — participated. The 29 men who were arrested previously had chatted with a decoy pretending to be a 13-year-old girl, and had arranged to meet “her” at the home.

None of the men arrested were from Petaluma, which is not surprising, since sexual predators often feel safer when they drive out of their immediate area for such meetings, Stapleton said.

After the operation, Petaluma police officers continued to act as decoys as they tried to nab Internet predators.

“But people wouldn’t even talk with us,” Stapleton said. “As soon as they found out that we were from the Petaluma area, they completely cut off communication with us.

“One person even said, ‘Not so fast, my Dateline friend.’”

Lt. Mike Cook feels that the operation helped to make the Petaluma community, in general, more cognizant of Internet predators.

“Some predators are online 24/7. If the operation caused parents to be a little more concerned with what their children are doing online, it was well worth it,” he said.

The operation involved 50 law-enforcement personnel each day, from five different law-enforcement agencies —Petaluma Police Department, Santa Rosa Police Department, Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office, Sonoma County District Attorney’s Office and California Department of Justice.

“They each contributed 10 to 12 officers. By sharing the responsibilities, no one agency was significantly impacted,” he said, adding that the cost to each agency is unavailable.

Current staffing shortages make it difficult to conduct a similar operation, Stapleton said.

“But if we have the resources in the future, absolutely, we might do one,” he said. “I don’t think we would do a Dateline sting again, but we established a partnership with Perverted Justice, so they could help us, if necessary.

“Perverted Justice did everything, as promised. They were a perfect partner.”

(Contact Dan Johnson at dan.johnson@arguscourier. com)