The Coffs Coast Pedo Hunter is unemployed father Cameron East.
The Coffs Coast Pedo Hunter is unemployed father Cameron East.
The "Coffs Coast Pedo Hunter" lures in alleged paedophiles by posing as an underage girl - and he's motivated by a family friend who raised him and was abused as a child.
Based on the New South Wales mid-north coast, he sets up a meeting after texting the alleged offenders - he claims to often receive explicit images and requests - then carries out a kind of "bust" that he records and posts online.
His name is reportedly Cameron East and he's a father on the dole, serving a 12-month suspended sentence for home invasion, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. It began one night while he was "mucking around" around on Tinder and decided to pretend to be an underage girl, he told the newspaper.
Since September, he has posted seven videos online allegedly exposing paedophiles. The identities of the men were not obscured.
East posts images online of men who respond to his messages.
East said he wanted to raise awareness of the issue of paedophiles in the area and that: "the numbers that are out there, there's no way the police would keep tabs on them all."
"I'm probably the only person on the dole that Australia likes."
However, police said his actions, while well intentioned, did not help.
Coffs/Clarence Local Area Command crime manager Detective Inspector Darren Jameson said most of East's material would be inadmissible in court.
East posts one of the men he has "exposed" and messages he says the man sent.
East does not obscure the men's faces in his posts.
"Our focus in relation to suspected paedophiles is about catching them and putting them before the courts. This type of vigilante behaviour ignores those rules of evidence so it puts at strong risk the capability for us to obtain a prosecution or conviction in the future," he told the Sydney Morning Herald.
Of further concern was potential cases of mistaken identity involving those in the videos and innocent people being targeted.
He added that East could be compromising existing police activities or risking himself - East's latest video appears to show a man attempting to hit him in his car.
Despite that, East's videos have thousands of views and hundreds of comments in support - even those who have said he should be paid.
East said being sued for his actions was not a concern to him because he had no money.
Western Sydney University criminologist Michael Salter called East's behaviour more "macho grandstanding" than child protection, the Herald reported.
Although vigilante action by civilians was increasing, no evidence existed to show it protected children.
Salter also said catching paedophiles in a manner similar to East was an area where police were active and had "a lot" of resources.
Jameson previously told the Advocate: "The actions of community members in being vigilantes against crimes, even those that are highly deplorable like sexual assault, cannot be supported."
Two Coffs Harbour men have been charged with using a carriage service to procure someone under 16 for sexual activity, as well as using a carriage service to send indecent material to a person under 16.
