NBC Settles "To Catch A Predator" Suicide Lawsuit For Undisclosed Amount

NEW YORK — NBC Universal has settled a $105 million lawsuit brought by a woman who claimed a televised sex sting by "Dateline NBC: To Catch A Predator" drove her brother to kill himself.

"The matter has been amicably resolved to the satisfaction of both parties," said a statement released by both sides. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

Patricia Conradt's lawsuit had claimed her brother, a suburban Dallas prosecutor, fatally shot himself after he was accused of engaging in a sexually explicit online chat with an adult posing as a 13-year-old boy.

The lawsuit claimed NBC "steamrolled" authorities to arrest Louis William Conradt Jr. after telling police he failed to show up at a sting operation 35 miles away.

NBC was working with the activist group Perverted Justice on the sting, in which people impersonating children established online chats with men and tried to lure them to a house, where they were met by TV cameras and police.

In February, a federal judge issued a scathing ruling in the case, saying a jury might conclude the network "crossed the line from responsible journalism to irresponsible and reckless intrusion into law enforcement."

U.S. District Judge Denny Chin said the lawsuit contained sufficient facts to make it plausible that the suicide was foreseeable, that police had a duty to protect Conradt from killing himself and that the officers and NBC acted with deliberate indifference.

New episodes of "To Catch A Predator" ended in December, with the future of the series uncertain.

"Right now we are working on other investigative stories focusing on national security and the economy," NBC spokeswoman Jenny Tartikoff said Wednesday in an e-mail. "If we do more, we want to make sure we are complementing past investigations not just repeating them."

Comments

[Eric8869]

It was just another diversion so the NBC news division didn't have to cover the war or the Bush white house. so sad.

[MACS]

.
Did not the NBC nemesis O'Lielly also settle a sexual herasment suit prior to the court trial???
.

[chickenhawkwarrior]

WTF?

[GrkAm]

There is such a fine line here. Any sane individual can't say that they want to see children in peril from pedophiles. But then again, the NBC "Predator" lost it's investigative edge when it became a weekly show putting money in NBC's pockets and Chris Bury's name became well known.

[eyecon]

Actually, they lost their edge when they subcontracted to Perverted Justice, If you do some impartial investigation, you may come to the conclusion that they are incredibly irresponsible, Their leader has used PJ to retaliate in personal grievances. Paid to deliver, it wouldn't shock me at all to find altered chat logs.

I am amazed that so many of the prosecutions held up to chain of custody issues on the transcript. Furthermore, NBC became agents of law enforcement.

[LiberalBuzz]

PJ itself should be investigated. They are some sick individuals.

[NewRiver]

Chris Hansen

[OlongapoEd]

It is obvious that children should be protected from predators (they also need to be better protected from predators within their own family, but that's another discussion). However, when an "anything goes" mentality takes hold, justice itself is abused, and you get cases like the Little Rascals Day Care case and the McMartin Preschool case:

http://www.lewrockwell.com/anderson/anderson168.html
http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/mcmartin/mcmartinaccount.html

None of this is an argument that Conradt (the brother) was blameless (although the usual suspects will almost certainly try to say that it is). However, there are right ways and wrong ways to go about dealing with predators. Sad to say, though, the "Kill them all--God will recognize His own" mentality is still far too common.

Hey, I've got an idea! How about bringing back public hangings! Better yet, televise them!

[Chalkeater]

One thing no one disputes, Bill Conradt sent these messages to what he thought was a 13 year old boy -

"could I feel your ****”

“how thick are you”

“i want to feel your ****”

“maybe you can **** me several times”

“has anyone sucked you”

“just talking about this has me hard”

NBC is the villain and this is the victim?

[NoSillyName]

Sounds exactly like that Republican senator's emails, texts, and phone calls to the Senate Pages.

[raw6464]

There's a very old saying which puts this in perspective... TWO WRONGS DON'T MAKE A RIGHT. As much as I agree pedophiles are abhorant, but so are the slim buckets in NBC.

There's was "something" I didn't like about this show and stopped watching it after the first one. You can't go any lower in profiting on another persons misery. Especially the show in question of a man dies and NBC still airs it... FOR PROFIT! Chris Hansen your a one POS!

[matandch]

That's what always troubled me about the show too. If NBC was so interested in protecting minors from predators then they wouldn't have taken a cent in profit. Moreover, no one in the production team should have taken a dime in salary either. Rather, all the money raied by the show should have been donated to charities helping victums of predatory sex crimes.

[CLP]

NBC would insist that the decoys would never be the first to raise the issue of sex. Yet once the isse was raised, the decoys would continue to lie (about their identity and their intentions) in order to advance the criminal activity. And I think that is wrong.

[eyecon]

In point of fact, you have no way of knowing what transpired in the chat or under what circumstances. You only know what Perverted Justice (who had a financial incentive for "results") provided to NBC which in turn, they provided to their audience. While I am sure that NBC issued those instructions to PJ, I am equally sure that they did not adequately supervise them.

NBC had a significant financial interest as well. Law enforcement should be the province of impartial agents without an economic incentive.

[IncredulousGeezer]

What kind of sick folks watch the entrapment, verbal humiliation and finally the physical abuse of these poor pedos as they are thrown to the ground for no reason and handcuffed as their "episode" ends?

Folks just marginally less sick than the pederasts themselves. The latter are driven by a compulsion; what motivates the audience?

"Dateline NBC: To Catch A Predator" got off easy, I'd guess. A show that costs next to nothing to produce & only this one settlement. Bet the NBC accountants rubbed their hands in glee.

[coldcanuckinwhite]

This has got to be one of the sickest shows. And to know that people are actually watching it. UUGGGGHHH!!

[Cakey4814]

I'm shocked at these comments. Unless you've been living under a rock you know about the Dateline series and yet these men still try to set up dates with minors. And now a sister is profiting from it..only in America!!

[RobotHouse]

Making people want to kill themselves is such great television. The only reason this is successful is because it gives people a common enemy, someone they can look at and think "well at least I'm better than that guy" makes you feel all that much better about cheating on your wife because "at least you're not a pedophile". It's sick either way. pedophile or not, there is no reason a person should be paraded around on television. its called compassion, and common human decency, something many Americans lack.

[Marioth]

The most startling aspect of this series is the sheer number of men we're talking about. No matter where they took this program, the men turned out like mosquitos at a bloodletting.

If one extrapolates the numbers, we find that a city such as Los Angeles has hundreds of thousands of these men on the loose.

Locking them up does no good because eventually they have to be set free. When they come out, they are concentrated together in half-way houses, and this does not address the problem, but it does increase the chances criminal behavior beyond feeing up kids.

And the problem is this: our puritanical society cannot engage in an adult conversation where the words "sex" and "children" are used in the same sentance. If hundreds of thousands of guys in LA do this, we're talking many millions across the country. And most abuse those they know in silence.

Silence = Death

We need to find a way to talk this out and find out what is really going on. The force that moves these men is clearly presently out of our control, and we remain terrified to paralysis by it.

And NO women. Not one. Not a single female. Utterly fascinating, and we do not talk about it.

Pax,
M.

[True]

I hear what you're saying.

But i don't think you're seeing the whole picture. There may not be any women on "to catch a predator" but there are plenty of women having sex with minors. Look at all the teachers with their students, for example, or the mom who tried to initiate sex with her daughter a while back.
I don't think that our society views sexual abuse initiated by women "as bad as" sexual abuse initiated by men. There was even a movie called Tadpole a while back about two cougars pursuing an underage boy, but i saw no protests going up over that movie. Can you imagine if the roles were reversed?

Once again, I hear you, but let's not make this a "man" issue.

Cheers, True

[Marioth]

The "whole picture" is that no women have appeared in this series.

The "whole picure" is that only a handful of women have been charged nationwide compared to the hundreds of thousands in LA county alone.

The "whole picture" is that we raise our men-folk in sexual silence, and our women-folk only slightly less so. We leave it to children to figure it out, and then act agast at the results. The world is now too small for this deadly absurdity.

Only an ongoing, adult conversation about it is going to solve it. Have you talked to any children about sex and sexuality with love, and in a way that lifts them up lately? Do this for, say, 18 years, and get back to me about the "whole picture." This has to be done for a generation or two before we can even get close to the problems presented in this TV show.

Silence = Death

Pax,
M.

[mono]

I love America, the land of opportunity. This sister might be meeting with her brother, once or twice in a year, like on July 4th barbecue or thanks-giving dinner. This is how she shows the love and affection for her pedophile brother, cashing money on his death.

I liked the show, very much. They guys are sick. They should be put behind the bars.

[jcause28]

The police and civil community should do almost anything within their power to protect children from pedophiles. That being said, this show is disgusting. I really don't care about shaming some dude trying to get with a 12 yr. old kid. But a lot of these people have kids of their own, wives. It would be bad enough when a family deals with something like this... but can you imagine how damaging it would be to a kid if his/her father was seen on this show. Just imagine the torment they would face at school.