FL- 'Predator' sting group rejects judge's order

9-26-2008 Florida:

BUNNELL -- Perverted Justice, the controversial group that worked with "Dateline NBC" in its "To Catch a Predator" sting in Flagler Beach, refused to comply with a judge's order to allow an expert to examine its computer, defense attorneys said during a hearing Thursday.

-This is troubling, over the years there have been many claims questioning the methods used by this group, and here -for unknown reasons- they refuse a court order. Makes one wonder what such a search would have uncovered and whether such might even be illegal. Could the house of cards come tumbling down...

But it may be a non-issue if defense attorneys accept a plea agreement offered this week by prosecutors. Ted Zentner, who spoke for a group of four defense attorneys at the hearing before Circuit Judge Kim C. Hammond, declined to reveal details of the offer.

Prosecutor Jennifer Carlson, who Zentner said made the offer, could not be reached for comment. No one at Perverted Justice could be reached for comment.

If the case is not settled, then Perverted Justice's refusal to allow access to its computer would have to be dealt with, Zentner said after the hearing.

Zentner represents Todd Spikes, 43, a former Alabama police officer who was fired after his arrest during the sting. Zentner also represents another man arrested in the sting, Daniel Kelly, 46, of Clearwater.

Spikes and Kelly were among 21 men who police said had sexually explicit online chats with decoys posing as children and then drove to a house in Flagler Beach to meet what they believed to be children during the sting in December 2006.

"We need to have somebody check their computer to make sure the logs as prepared are true and accurate statements of the actual chats," Zentner said after the hearing at the Kim C. Hammond Justice Center. "That's what the analysis was going to do for us. It was going to give us basically verification of the truthfulness of the chat log. And, without that, we have no way of determining whether they are, in fact, true and accurate. Because anybody can type anything in a chat log; that doesn't mean that's what was discussed online."

The problem is not with prosecutors but with Perverted Justice, said Mark Rosenblum, an attorney who represents Michael Reyes of Branford, who was also arrested in the sting.

"(Perverted Justice comes) across as if they were a law enforcement agency, or at least a quasi-law enforcement agency, and then when a judge like Judge Hammond orders them to do something, they flaunt it," Rosenblum said.

Zentner said he and the other defense attorneys sent an expert to check the Perverted Justice computer in Louisville, Ky., only to have the person turned away without reason and despite the order from Hammond.

NBC pays the controversial Oregon-based group, which has volunteers pose as minors in Internet chat rooms where the topic sometimes turns to sex. Dateline then sets up sting houses, where cameras film anyone who shows up to meet actors they thought were minors.

Other defense attorneys present Thursday included Fritz Scheller, who represents Oanh Le of Orlando, and Harrison Slaughter, who represents Michael Collins of Apopka.

Spikes, who lives in DeFuniak Springs but had commuted to work in nearby Florala, Ala., was one of the more notable arrests in the sting since he was a police officer. Spikes is charged with attempted lewd or lascivious battery, two counts of lewd or lascivious exhibition, and computer pornography and child exploitation. ..News Source.. by FRANK FERNANDEZ, Staff Writer