Courts / Dublin / Report

Defence tells court that child profile sting was 'entrapment'

Date
2021-10-08

Stage
Hearing Or Decision

Primary locality
Dublin

County
Dublin

Summary

In a Dublin Circuit Criminal Court hearing, Ioan Ovidiu (54) was found guilty of attempting to meet a child for sexual activity after responding to a fake child's profile on the adult dating site Fastmeet. The profile was operated by a volunteer group that set up decoy accounts to catch online predators. Ovidiu was told the woman was 14 and sent a photograph of a teenager to support this claim. He continued communication, requesting explicit images and sending his own. An arrangement was made to meet at a supermarket in Mulhuddart on 27 May 2018. He was confronted by a hostile crowd, restrained, and taken to a Garda station. A forensic analysis of his phone revealed an image of a naked adult male touching a child's genitals, estimated to be about nine years old.

Who, what, where, when and why

What: Report matter: Defence tells court that child profile sting was 'entrapment'. Charges or matters: possession of child pornography at Blakestown Way, Mullhuddart on May 27. Procedural stage: hearing_or_decision

When:

May 2018 Hearing Or Sentence
May 27 Incident
May 20 Incident
March 23 Incident
2021-10-08 Publication

Why: In order to do this, the person behind the fake profile told Ovidiu that she was actually a 14 year old girl and sent a head and shoulders photograph of a teenager to him to back this up. CNI source report