NBC resolves lawsuit over 'To Catch a Predator' suicide

NEW YORK — NBC Universal has “amicably resolved” a $105-million lawsuit filed by a woman whose brother committed suicide during a taping of its controversial “Dateline NBC” series “To Catch a Predator,” both parties said today.

Bruce Baron, an attorney for Patricia Conradt, told The Times in an interview today that “the matter has been amicably resolved to the satisfaction of both parties.”

Conradt’s brother, Louis William Conradt Jr., a 56-year-old assistant county prosecutor in a Dallas suburb, shot himself in November 2006 when officers showed up at his house as part of a pedophilia sting arranged by “Dateline.”

Patricia Conradt sued NBC last July, claiming that the network interfered with police duties and then failed to protect her brother's safety.

When asked today about the status of the suit, NBC News spokeswoman Jenny Tartikoff echoed Baron, saying “the matter has been amicably resolved.”

Both sides declined to comment on when they came to agreement or the terms of the resolution. A sealed document regarding the suit was filed with the court June 3, but the case remains open, according a spokesman for the New York Southern District Court.

The resolution of the lawsuit caps a controversial chapter for “Dateline,” which drew both ratings bonanzas and sharp critiques for its “To Catch a Predator” investigations. In the segments, which NBC began airing in 2004, the newsmagazine worked with an Internet watchdog group called Perverted Justice to contact men online who were seeking to meet underage children for sex, then lure them to a house, where they were confronted on camera. Police waiting outside then arrested the men.

Media ethicists objected to the deception used in the investigation, as well as NBC’s close relationship with law enforcement agencies in the jurisdictions where it set up stings.

NBC News executives staunchly defended the “Predator” investigations but eventually concluded the series had become too highly charged to continue. “Dateline” quietly aired its 12th and final installment of “Predator” in late December.

Tartikoff said that “Dateline” is currently focused on investigative stories about national security and the economy, adding that if the newsmagazine pursues further “Predator” segments, “we want to make sure we are complementing past investigations, not just repeating them.”

Louis Conradt was one of two dozen men in the Dallas-Fort Worth area snared by the ninth “Predator” sting in the fall of 2006. He allegedly engaged in a sexually explicit online chat with a Perverted Justice member posing as a 13-year-old boy, and then an actor invited Conradt to meet him at a decoy house NBC set up in Murphy, Texas.

But Conradt did not show up at a camera-rigged house, where “Dateline” correspondent Chris Hansen and local police were waiting, outfitted with cameras provided by NBC, Hansen later told Dallas-Fort Worth television station WFAA-TV, which did its own investigation into the incident.

The next day, a "Dateline" crew and a team of officers went to find Conradt at his home in a nearby town. "Dateline" cameras taped the scene as a police tactical team forced its way into Conradt’s house. As the officers entered, Conradt shot himself with a small-caliber semi-automatic handgun. He died later at a nearby hospital.

The incident was featured in a “To Catch a Predator” segment that aired on “Dateline” in February 2007.

In her lawsuit, Patricia Conradt accused NBC of being “concerned more with its own profits than with pedophilia.”

She claimed a police officer at the scene of the shooting told a “Dateline” producer: “That’ll make good TV.”

The network said her suit was without merit.

But in February, U.S. District Judge Denny Chin ruled that the case could go forward on claims of intentional infliction of emotional distress and violation of civil rights.

Chin dismissed some causes of action but said in his ruling that the network “placed itself squarely in the middle of a police operation, pushing the police to engage in tactics that were unnecessary and unwise, solely to generate more dramatic footage for a television show.”

“A reasonable jury could find that by doing so, NBC created a substantial risk of suicide or other harm, and that it engaged in conduct so outrageous and extreme that no civilized society should tolerate it,” Chin wrote.

At the time, NBC said it planned to fight the claim, saying it had “acted responsibly and lawfully.”

“Dateline’s” Murphy sex sting failed to net any convictions. The Collin County district attorney’s office declined to pursue more than 20 cases related to the “Predator” operation, citing problems with the evidence gathered.

--Matea Gold

matea.gold@latimes.com

Photo: "To Catch a Predator" host Chris Hansen (NBC Media Village)

Comments

[mshazen]

If you think justice was served, you have not been raped as a child. I'm glad he put a gun to his head if he was not guilty he would not have done it. Glad one more chld rapist is gone. now if the rest would just remove themselves.

[OGWiseman]

Pedophiles aren't evil people, they're sick. They have a serious mental/emotional illness, typically brought on by severe abuse from their own childhoods. Without making any excuses for the pedophiles' behavior, we can say that it is at least questionable that NBC would take advantage of the mentally ill to boost ratings.

Further, if NBC was actually getting pedophiles off the streets, I'd say more power to them. However, they aren't doing that. Read all the way to the bottom of the article and you'll see that 20 cases JUST FROM THIS ONE STING were dropped by the DA due to problems with the evidence.

You can't pose as a small child online in order to entrap people and expect it to hold up in court. In fact, the thousands of 'cases' that NBC has created have resulted in almost no convictions (not sure if there's been any at all). They aren't interested in justice. They're exploiting sick people for money.

[john eblen]

It is impossible for me to rationalize how anyone can protest against NBC protecting 13 year old children from predatory adults. Once they entered a home where they believed an unprotected child was, they crossed the point of no return. What would these same people say if they had to watch their loved ones having sex with a 13 year old child? THANK YOU NBC for saving a hundred children from almost certain sexual abuse by adult predators and shame on these sympathizers for forgetting these victims are children.

[HACIMS]

So, if the cops kick in your door, the first thing you do is kill yourself. That's not the actions of an innocent man. He did something.

[wusan]

greed has became this country's great family value! US number 1 baby.

[BruntLIVE]

Americans don't like "To Catch a Predator" (especially white men) because it's an alternative to COPS on FOX who shows blacks on a regular basis. The idea of white suburban men being arrested and shown to be sockless perverts bothers Americans, except when it's blacks on COPS on Fox. You people are pathetic. White America do not like to see themselves in compromising positions, they can't judge then.

[rick]

This show was disgusting. Someone posing as a 13-year old is not a 13-year old. Didn't MSNBC ever hear of role playing? The people posing as youths, based on the few incidents I saw, didn't even speak like real 13-year olds. How could they? What these guys were into were adults pretending to be 13-year olds, which probably isn't a crime. Or is it?

[John Auston]

..........Ahhhh,yes!!!

The familiar smell of good old,American-style cyber-vigilanteism!!!

Kinda like a recurring proto version of "The Ox-Bow Incident".Doncha thank??

[Jerry Schimmer]

My condolences to NBC. I hope they made enough money over the 10+ episodes to may off the predators sister and still make a profit. In my eyes NBC didn't earn enough money for all the good they did in exposing these predators. For all of you "fantasy roll player" enablers out there, your arguemnt contains a major flaw. Many of these people showed up. You don't show up if you are roll playing. Also none of these chats were set up as a "roll play". These predators came in with "gun" blazing looking for a child. Not a single one said, "let's rollplay".

Conradt took the easy way out. I would have much rather seen him in a cell with all the criminals he has put away. But I'm not going to quibble over a dead predator.

[lydia]

The sister had cause to sue the NBC for entrapment. Her brother didn't turn up for the sting, the matter should have been dropped there. Why did they have to ferret out his whereabouts and chase him down to his home and kick his door in. In my opinion he is not a pedophile until he commits the crime. I don't know what the crime is for talking dirty to kids, but when I was a child there was always some dirty old man we were warned to stay clear off. As a mother I see no joy in people pretending to be children to catch pedophiles. The thought police can't claim to know exactly he was planning to do until he does it.

[Will]

I am 100% confused at the people on here defending Louis Conradt. He was on the internet trying to have cybersex with someone he thought was 13 years old , right? He made arrangements to meet with this person for the sole purpose of having sex, right?

Then he killed himself instead of proving his innocents in a court of law(he was a lawyer)...or claiming it was only role playing.....that pretty much sounds like he was a pedophile or at least someone who's fantasies had CROSSED a line, right?

So why are you defending him? Is it your need to justify and validate your own "urges"?
Well..I can't wish you luck with that. I can however hope that you follow Mr. Conradt's example. End it.

The saddest thing is that God only knows how many children he actually victimized..because that's what you pedophiles do....you victimize and destroy the lives of children. Since he was 55 years old, there most likely ARE victims, he wouldn't have been able to resist his sick urges for that long.

So, who are these victims and are they mentally OK? I have a feeling his sister will not try to track them all down and make sure they get counseling! Yet, I bet she's already picked out the new car she'll buy herself once she gets all that cash....the cash that someones child suffered for. It's blood money.

Shame on her, him and all of you that are cheering .

[David, Portland OR]

While the suicide implies his guilt, that is what implies NBCs guilt as well.

We have a justice system so people can have a fair trial, an honest trial, before a jury, and according to laws.

That is the hallmark of any civilized society, and the lack of it the hallmark of a 3rd world country.

It does not matter that he was likely guilty - what mattered was that a court of law was to determine his guilt fairly. And if he was so guilty, why were the 20 other 'investigations' done in the same city all dropped as having insufficient evidence??????

The man deserved his right to jury trial.

Busting into his house with a camera crew breeds fear and irrationalism, and THAT is what leads to things like suicide.

If the police had showed up rationally, and calmly, with appropriate evidence, likely he would have gone peacefully for his day in court.

It's the fact they did a forced entry, with a TV crew, on insufficient evidence. NBC was due to hang in court, then - not to mention the local police department as well. 'good TV', eh?

I am a victim of childhood sexual abuse. And don't try to tell me that death is the only solution for the perpetrator. That person, is a very, very sick person. They did not kill me, and they should not die either.

For if that person knew he would face death for what he did, he would likely have killed me. I am here today, because the punishment fit the crime - and that punishment is not death.

Maybe the Code of Hammurabi is the kind of law bearing society you wish for, but I prefer a civil society governed by rational law.

[look at the research]

This thread has some of the most uninformed comments I've seen on a message board in awhile (and that's saying alot).

First, being attracted to a sexually mature person does not make you a "pedophile." A pedophile is attracted to pre-pubescent children. All of the decoy pictures they used were of post-pubescent people.

Second, while sex with someone under 16 is not "consentual" in the strictest sense, there is a significant difference between an adult and a 14 year old agreeing to have sex, and an adult using physical violence (or the threat thereof) to force him/herself onto a victim. I repeat, yes, both are not technically "consentual" but all you people saying "kill all perverts" must recognize a significant difference in the crimes.

Third, sex offenders, when taken broadly have about a 2% re-offense rate, which is the second lowest of all crimes. When you break that apart into the myriad crimes that fall under the "sex offense" designation, some segments, like public indecency and sexual misconduct with a minor are less than 1% reoffense or so low that it is statistically insignificant. Most of the people captured in these stings will be less likely than the general population of men age 18-60 to commit a sex crime if they complete treatment.

In other words a random person with no criminal record is more likely to commit a sex crime than someone from these stings who has completed court-ordered treatment.

Fourth, these stings do nothing to help victims or reduce sex crimes whatsoever. Honestly, did anyone watch "To Catch a Predator" and suddenly realize that some adults meet underage people online for sex? Anyone suggesting that these sting operations reduce crime have a fundamental misunderstanding about criminal behavior.

Fifth, while I have nothing but respect for survivors of sexual abuse, it is irresponsible to suggest that any victims have been saved because of these sting operations. Over 80% of sex crimes occur from family members. All these stings do is teach offenders to hide their behavior more effectively.

Full disclosure, I am involved in the treatment of sex offenders. I know some may say that makes me biased, but the research speaks for itself. These people need help. Some need incarceration for a time, but if they complete treatment, they should be allowed to transition back to society.

I've quoted too many statistics to properly link to all my sources, but a good start for those interested is the Human Right's Watch report titled "No Easy Answers."

Thank you

[Dirk]

JACKPOT. Almost makes you forget that the guy who died was a known perv who took the easy way out.

[Chad]

If NBC and ''Dateline'' were SO concerned about the welfare of children, they would be showing all the children who are dying in Iraq so continuously. They would stand up to the government mandate to block the war imagery, (which includes children, and A LOT ot them), instead of handing us titillating garbage disguised as ''child saving''. Too bad they don't have honor.

[Sandy]

Pedophiles deserve NO MERCY. How else are we going to flush them out? I'm well acquainted with predators & child abuse - after 50+ years, I'm still having flashbacks. This is no joke.

I say BRAVO to all the people working to curtail this social cancer. We need more people to understand and combat not only the predators, but the apathetic & sympathetic mindset that allows the crime to perpetuate itself.

[Joe Abbruscato]

Why doesnt NBC do a little investigating of the Bush White House- when is the media going to finally start telling the american people whats been going on for 6 years!

[Eric]

I saw this program before when it was set in Florida. I still don't understand why former Republican congressman and predator Mark Foley was never charged with anything and is living carefree in Florida while Louis William Conradt and others are handcuffed and thrown in jail for their sexual conversations alone.

[CaptainVideo]

Since the decoy was the one that suggested the meeting, this was a clear case of attempted entrapment. When it is the decoy who suggests the meeting, there is no way of knowing in such cases whether the person involved would have gone to the site on his own volition if he had not been lured to it by the decoy. Deliberately enticing a person to engage in an illegal act is what constitutes entrapment. The fact that he did not go to the site proves that this was indeed a case of attempted entrapment.
The second problem is why the police broke into the apartment without any prior evidence that the person would not voluntarily allow the police to enter.
Since he did not go to the site and since, in fact, he did not engage in lewd conversation with a minor (even though he though he did) he did not break any laws.
Instead of committing suicide, he should have sued the police and the station for every cent he could have gotten out of them.

[daedalux]

Of course predators should be caught and prosecuted. No question about that. But it seems more important that our TV outpace the numbness of our voyeristic brains by continually becoming more
ruthlessly sensationlistic at all cost. That show was not created to protect children; that show was created to make $$$$$$$$ !!!!!!!