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It also brought a warning from a top law enforcement official about playing vigilante.
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UPDATE: Detectives arrested a 33-year-old Jersey Shore man on luring and attempted sexual assault charges after a YouTube creator lured him into a meeting by posing as a 14-year-old girl, authorities said.
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"Private citizens who take it upon themselves to investigate what they believe to be criminal conduct may compromise the potential investigation," Ocean County Prosecutor Bradley D. Billhimer said. "They can also find themselves in a very dangerous situation. Please leave criminal investigations to the professionals."
The man – who identified himself to Daily Voice as Rashawn Bass -- created his “Minority vs Predator” channel this past August to provide a series of tips that “shed some light and bring awareness to the amount of online child predators exist, and how easily your child could become a victim.”
Bass upped the ante on Sunday, posting a video he made showing him communicating with and then meeting a man who tells him on camera that he came expecting to meet an underage girl.
First he showed a text exchange in which he posed as a 14-year-old girl who agreed to meet the man at a pizzeria in Toms River before going to a hotel.
Then , with his cellphone recording video, he finds the man at a table at the pizzeria, sits down and tells him he wants to interview him for a psychological study.
Using the name "Minnow," he repeatedly assures the man that he’s not involved in law enforcement and wasn’t judging him.
The man, saying he’s a "vaper," asks to go outside to chat.
“I’m not here to hurt you, and vice versa,” Bass tells him outside, repeating that he’s not with law enforcement, that there is no threat and that the man can leave any time he wants.
A conversation follows in which the man talks about his mother dying last year and some of his “tendencies."
“I’m not a sicko,” the man tells him. “I’m not, like, a date rapist….It would have to be consensual all the way around.”
After the man asks him how much longer he has to endure the questions, Bass says: “I’m not a cop. You can go whenever you want.
“As a matter of fact, I have to make sure that you do leave. But I do have to record you leaving the premises.”
Which he does.
The video raced to 150,000 views in a little over 24 hours.
Billhimer, the Ocean County prosecutor, said his High Tech Crime and Special Victims units were "investigating the authenticity" of Sunday's video.
Meanwhile, he reminded the public that "any investigation into criminal activity should be left to law enforcement professionals.
“Investigations into alleged criminal activity must be conducted by trained law enforcement officials -- with the assistance of members of the public when and where appropriate," the prosecutor emphasized.
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