A longtime and “high-profile” employee of the Township of Langley is the latest victim of a controversial vigilante group after allegedly engaging in a sexual conversation with a an underage girl.
Video released by the group once known as Surrey Creep Catchers Wednesday shows a man who they say is the employee being confronted over an apparent months-long correspondence between himself and a 13-year-old girl, who was actually group member Ryan Laforge conducting a sting operation.
The man — whose identity is being concealed beyond the fact he’s in his 60s — also admits he arranged a meeting with the girl for later this week before backing out.
“Why are we here?” Laforge asks the man at the beginning of the video.
“Because I was communicating with a woman who was underage,” he responds.
Laforge told Global News he arranged the meeting with the man after discovering he was a Township of Langley employee.
Over the course of the conversation, the man admits he went on a dating site intending to have sexual conversations, and eventually made contact with someone he thought was an 18-year-old woman.
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Laforge then says the girl admitted to being 13 during their correspondence, which the man appears to agree with.
The man then continued to pursue a sexual conversation, Laforge says the “chat logs” show, something the man also appears to agree with.
“I seen you saying to her, ‘You look older than that. I can’t believe you’re 13. Really?’” Laforge says.
“Hmmm, yeah,” the man responds.
The man then says he planned to meet with the girl five or six times before cancelling each time. That was when Laforge says he discovered he was talking to a township employee.
Laforge then confronts the man on his marriage and his children, one of whom the man admits is a 14-year-old girl.
“Do you plan on telling your wife?” Laforge asks. “Do you plan on getting counselling? What’s your next step?”
WATCH: (Aired May 28, 2018) Grace Ke reports on Ryan Laforge’s court plea for assault
“I do want to get counselling, yes,” the man responds.
The employee has not responded to requests for comment.
Creep Catchers is a loose collection of organizations across Canada whose members claim to expose people they allege are child sexual predators by posing online as minors before meeting in person to film and berate their targets.
The Surrey chapter of the collective was recently renamed the Safe Child Coalition.
Laforge defended making the video and naming the employee on his group’s website and Facebook page, despite past stings raising privacy concerns from the public and police.
“My job is to expose what I know, and that’s an adult male having inappropriate sexual conversations with a would-be child, and I think the community has the right to know who that is,” Laforge said Thursday.
He also said the man’s response in the video wasn’t surprising.
“It’s always the same, I know what I’m getting into,” he said. “He’s just telling me what I wanted to hear.”
WATCH: (Aired April 4 2017) Rumina Daya reports on the controversy surrounding the Creep Catchers group
In a statement, the Township of Langley confirmed the suspect is an employee who is currently on leave.
“We recognize the seriousness of what has been alleged, and the Township will take steps as appropriate having regard for due process and in consideration of its role as an employer, the public interest and the privacy rights of individuals,” the township’s statement reads.
The township added it will cooperate with any RCMP investigation, and that there will be no further comment.
Laforge said he plans to hand over all his information, including the video, to Surrey RCMP.
Creep Catchers stings have ensnared high-profile people across the Lower Mainland and the Fraser Valley before.
In 2016, separate stings led to charges against both a member of the Surrey RCMP and a former Mission elementary school principal.
The charges against the principal were later stayed, but the RCMP member was sentenced to four months to be served in the community for breach of trust after being discharged from the force.
—With files from Jill Bennett