Maine State Police on Tuesday defended itself against online criticism over an activists’ attempt to gather evidence of alleged child sexual exploitation by a Maine man.
The police agency issued a statement Tuesday evening saying it takes child exploitation and the rights of people accused of crimes seriously. State police said there is an active investigation into the alleged child exploitation “to ensure the rights of all involved.”
The statement was in response to activist Alex Rosen and his group Predator Poachers’ claims on social media that they posed as a 13-year-old girl to exchange messages with a Maine man until they got evidence of him soliciting the girl for sex.
The police agency said there is no way to confirm that the tactics used by private groups like this conform with the investigatory standards law enforcement must follow and that these types of groups use tactics that are “at best questionable and at worst coercive.”
The group tried to give the video and text messages to Maine State Police, but the agency declined to accept, according to Rosen’s posts on X, formerly known as Twitter. The posts had more than 2 million combined views as of Tuesday.
Comments on Maine State Police social media posts were filled with people questioning the police’s decision to not accept the “evidence” and saying the police must be pedophiles.
The police agency said in a letter sent to Rosen that it’s the state’s duty to ensure no one’s rights were violated. The state must also confirm that no rights were violated when someone pretends to be someone else to get information.
“We take online child exploitation very seriously in this state, as seriously as we take the rights of those investigated for alleged criminal actions,” Maine State Police said.
State police said it employs six full-time investigating computer crimes against children and that there are multiple people across the state that also do those investigations.