Perverted Justice
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| Founded | 2002 |
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| Website | Perverted-Justice.com |
Perverted Justice Foundation, Inc., more commonly known as Perverted-Justice (also known as PeeJ), is an American organization based in California and Oregon, which investigates, identifies, and publicizes the conduct of adults posing as minors in order to solicit online sexual conversations with actual minors.
The activity of the Perverted-Justice website consists of online volunteers who carry out sting operations posing as children or teenagers (the age range chosen for the decoys is 10–15) on chat sites and waiting for adults to approach them. After obtaining identifying information of adults posing as minors, who may offer their telephone numbers and other details so that meetings can be arranged, the organization passes the information on to law enforcement. Perverted-Justice's methods are controversial, and a number of critics have labeled these actions harassment and possibly legal entrapment. The site additionally attracted media attention, both laudatory and critical, as a result of their collaboration with Dateline NBC on a series of televised sting operations called To Catch a Predator.
Perverted-Justice also operates a site that targets groups and individuals it identifies as being involved in the pedophile activism community, a site that provides information to abuse victims on their legal recourse, a site that gives advice to children and teenagers on dealing with grooming on the internet, and a site that targets organizations that Perverted-Justice believes allow pedophile activists to use their services. The foundation also offers free online training to law enforcement officers and has an intern program for college students.
Perverted Justice was set up in 2002 by Frank Fencepost and Xavier Von Erck (born Philip John Eide). The organization says that its online operations have led to 314 convictions as of March 28, 2009, with over 200 more currently awaiting trial, and an average of 25 arrests a month for the year of 2006. The organization reported an annual income of $825,000 a year in 2006 with Von Erck earning a salary of $120,000.
The site originally started with the posting of chat logs to shame people who engaged in sexual chats with purported children. Some members of the site allegedly went further by harassing the targets of their chats in real life, as well as their friends, neighbors, employers, and family. After a falling-out over a vitriolic chat log with a phone verifier in 2004, Fencepost was dismissed from the site. "Xavier became much more oriented toward getting pedophiles arrested rather than just making them complete social pariahs in their neighborhood," says Fencepost.
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