WHAT'S GOING ON WITH THE MANATEE COUNTY INTERNET SEX STINGS?

Looks like law enforcement officers in Manatee County are not happy with one of their Judges. This Judge Lakin has now granted 3 internet sex stings Motions to Dismiss due to entrapment by law enforcement officers in Operation Green Shepard I and II that will do what it take to make the arrest.

Sad, Sad, but so true. In this case, one of the Chatters was a Federal DHS officer working for the local Manatee County Sheriff's office on a federally funded DoJ ICAC Program. Not only was she one of the undercover agents, but was one of 4 that induced, enticed, coerced, and baited a young man to commit a crime. The 3 others were from Seminole Sheriff's Department, St. Petersburg, and Sanford Police Department.

Some where along the development of this program, the training of these law enforcement officers went haywire since it appears that they are loose cannons and not willing to comply with the rules and standards of the DoJ federally funded ICAC Program.

Here is a comment that Judge Lakin included in his decision granting the Motion to Dismiss,

"Therefore, upon diligent consideration, the Court finds that Defendant was entrapped as a matter of law. Further, given the Court's scrutiny of this case and the conduct of law enforcement, the Court finds it imperative for all law enforcement officials in this matter to receive copies of this Court's order and will direct service accordingly."

Those are very harsh words for a Judge to be telling law enforcement about their illegal conduct that led to the entrapment of the defendant.

Florida law enforcement, which includes the Manatee County Sheriff's Office and all the affiliated ICAC Task Force members, need to properly and in accordance to the DoJ ICAC Operational and Investigative Standards conduct legal internet sex stings. All ICAC Task Force members really need to read Judge Lakin's decision to have a clear understanding of egregious misconduct prior to participating in another Manatee County internet sex sting.
http://floridasexstinglawyer.com/?p=334

Does the ruling make you feel safer now...or perhaps maybe not so much when the ruling is overturned....

Run out of ambulance's to chase...????

Hey, got a response. If you read the case, you will see that the State will not get it overturned if they appeal this dismissal. The last 2 cases that Judge Lakin dismissed, the Appeals Court reaffirmed.

Damn, 4 cops worked on this kid for days and coerced him, chased him, and used egregious illegal tactics to get him to admit that he was interested in sex. The Judge saw right through this and that is why he dismissed the case. I just hope that the young man and his parents sue the hell out of the Sheriff's Department and the 4 cops that entrapped him.

I hope that you are not one of those law enforcement officers that support the use of illegal tactics to "GET THE ARREST".

The decision will NOT be overturned. However, the ruling is still flawed. The court should have ruled entrapment objectively since the defendant committed no crime. They tried and tried and tried to get this guy to commit a crime and he never did. Yet they arrested him anyway. Hence, it was a wrongful arrest which is egregious government conduct. Even though the defense never asked for the objective entrapment approach, the court had the duty to address it and rule accordingly. Subjective entrapment is to be only ruled by a judge when there are no undisputed facts and there were plenty of those. I.e. The prosecutor was stating this guy was a child predator (with no evidence to support that claim) and the defense was saying that he was set up to look like one. Hence, the court should have ruled the conduct egregious particularly because not only did law enforcement send provocative pictures of a GROWN woman, they also were posing as a promiscuous, lying teen (they originally lied about "her" age to access the ADULT website) looking for sex with a random, unsuspecting, innocent man on a website that has very little history and relatively no reputation as where minors go online.

1 Can we agree that law enforcement has an honorable & difficult job and their oath is to defend the constitution and their role is as peace officers to defend the people (including the people that sting operations target). Looks like with these stings, there is no specific target even, they don't know who they're talking to. Posting ads, getting responses, luring sex language (bait), switching age and hoping at least some people still come to you so you can arrest them - this is not an undercover sting operation, let alone law enforcement. Its just a random expedition.
2 Men caught in this exhibited no predisposition to pedophilia. They were respondents to adult dating profiles and luring, fully legal. At worst, they are guilty of bad judgement, but not of child sexual solicitation.
3 There is no victim, its a non-existing adult turned minor who happens to be a police decoy who was fully consenting, & enticing. A non-violent, victimless, thought error that ends up being a felony charge.
4 This is a massive deception & charade on unsuspecting men, that's unbecoming of the badge. Deception is allowed only to detect an ongoing crime in the absence of the actions of law enforcement personnel. A deceptive operation, in the guise of being designed to nab a criminal, has moral and ethical questions. The defendant, who besides being not pre-disposed, & presumed innocent, is lured into a situation under secrecy or confidentiality of the circumstances and he is accused of potential solicitation of minor for a possible crime. Though such a minor does not exist and such a crime is only presumed to possibly occur.

The question is how such a defendant can be held responsible for the situation which he would not have fallen into but for the enticement & charade of law enforcement in violation of the legal contractual clauses governing the use of an adult dating (or sexual meetup) website. The means deployed to establish the commission of the crime itself involves a culpable act. The judge is right in his ruling, people should be given the benefit of the doubt and law enforcement should not be in the elaborate act of such deception to artificially manufacture crime. Potentially, anyone and everyone could be a predator or potential criminal in violation of any random statute. The courts should not prosecute induced thought crime. Ruling by the judge is laudable.

Judge Lakin???

Carjacker with gang ties gets leniency from Manatee judge

The emotional moment occurred after Fernando Cabrera, a documented member of the SUR-13 Manatee County street gang since he was 15, received a split sentence for a 2011 carjacking the year he joined the gang. Cabrera's name with the gang is Raider. Pictures were shown of Cabrera giving hand signs for SUR-13 on social media sites.

Sorry, Don't think much of this judge.

I can definitely understand why LEOs in Manatee County despise Judge Lakin who is the only Judge in Manatee County who has served as a federal judge before and has the balls to see through these illegal internet sex stings and the egregious illegal conduct of law enforcement assigned to these ICAC Task Forces. His last statement in his last dismissal scolding LEO proves this.

He is probably taking a lot of heat from other Judges, the DA, Attorney General, and especially Sheriffs and law enforcement that are making these illegal arrests by entrapping innocent men via their "bait and switch" enticing, luring, and coercive tactics.

Just wish that the other Judges would have the balls to do what is right without the fear that they would not get reelected for another term, would be chastised by the media, and ridiculed by the local and country sheriff's and police departments. It takes guts to make these decisions and I as well as many others in Manatee County and Florida applaud his intestinal fortitude to do the right thing.

It takes guts to make these decisions and I as well as many others in Manatee County and Florida applaud his intestinal fortitude to do the right thing.

You mean like give extremely lenient sentences to hardened criminals...??

Guest,

What do you mean HARDENED CRIMINALS????

There you have men that have no criminal records and have never been arrested and you call them hardened criminals. Please read Judge Lakin's decision and don't play the ignorant LEO.

These young and older men have been entrapped by illegal tactics by law enforcement officers assigned to these DoJ ICAC Program funded Task Forces. They have become loose cannons that are doing what it takes to set the traps and solicitations to entrap these innocent men. This egregious conduct by LEOs needs to be punished and I hope that the U.S. Supreme Court also makes the same decision as Judge Lakin next month. There is a case up for their decision and the Florida Attorney General has until the 1st week of June 2014 to respond to the U.S. Supreme Court on the ICAC Program violations by Florida and some federal agencies supporting the Florida ICAC Task Forces.

These sex stings in my book are ok and should be conducted but do them to the legal standards and follow the law. When you only catch 1 or if lucky 2 or none at all out of 35 men that are true sex offenders, those are not good numbers to keep ruining the lives of these innocent men just to get the numbers to keep the DoJ federal funds flowing to Florida.

I just read that the State of Florida has now the special designation as the #1 U.S. Pedophile State in the Nation.