Team who exposed Hasan Suroor group of parents who’ve helped in 22 arrests

On Monday, well-known journalist Hasan Suroor was arrested in the UK “for meeting a child following sexual grooming” after a sting operation by a paedophile hunter group, Unknown TV. Members of the group had contacted him pretending to be a 14-year-old girl and 65-year-old Suroor was caught on camera admitting he had exchanged messages discussing sexual relations with "her", and had driven up to meet “her”. Unknown TV, consisting of a group of parents, is one of several paedophile hunter citizens groups that have sprung into action of late in the UK following a spate of cases of child sexual abuse. In an email interview, a member of Unknown TV says they launched their campaign because of the increasing number of “grooming gangs” (grooming refers to befriending of children to lower their resistance to sexual abuse) Edited excerpts:

What made you launch this campaign to expose paedophiles? Have any of you been victims?
No, we haven’t, but in the UK at the moment (the number of) grooming gangs are at the highest it has ever been.

Could you tell me how you came together to launch Unknown TV?
UnknownTV are a group of parents who actively hunt paedophiles in the UK and meet and arrest them under citizen’s arrest common law (In the UK, a person "other than a constable" may arrest without a warrant anyone “who is in the act of committing an indictable offence; or whom the person has reasonable grounds to suspect is committing an indictable offence.”)



When did you launch and how many perpetrators have you got arrested?
We have been operating for a month and have 22 arrests.



Could you explain your modus operandi? Do you inform the police before you confront the accused?
We do inform the police but I cannot go into detail of how we find them, sorry.

When did you contact Suroor, and how?
Last Thursday, and on Facebook.

A man called Gary Cleary committed suicide after another group of paedophile hunters helped expose him. What is your stand on such incidents?
To be honest, they chose to commit the crime and they chose to kill themselves, not me.

What has the response of the police been to your initiative?
Not bad, they are normally very helpful

Do you see yourselves as vigilantes?
No, we are not vigilantes. Vigilantes take the law into their own hands, we actively assist the law.