Authorities used the Louisiana Recovery Directive as a smokescreen to arrest fathers who are delinquent in their child support payments. In this sting operation, letters were sent to hundreds of men informing them a stimulus payment was waiting for them to pick up. When they arrived, however, they were arrested. The Saint Tammany Police Department sent out 900 letters to individuals with outstanding arrest warrants. Over 100 were arrested.
Sting operations are conducted by many different police agencies and can be employed to net arrests in a variety of crimes, from prostitution to child molestation to drug sales. Such operations are a very useful tool for law enforcement. It is important, however, to ensure these sting operations do not amount to entrapment.
The perfect example of a sting that went too far is the old case wherein undercover officers approached a man in order to purchase drugs. Initially, the man said he could not get any; however, this did not stop the officers from making many more efforts to purchase drugs from this man until, finally, drugs were purchased. The court ultimately threw the case out. The legal argument was the police had essentially caused a crime by getting a man to do something he would not normally have done but for the police.
In the case of delinquent dads, entrapment does not appear to be an issue. Although, caution should be used whenever law enforcement officers seek to use subterfuge in trapping citizens in illegal conduct.
