College student uses Snapchat gender swap filter to nab alleged predator cop

published 12 June 2019

Using Snapchat's new gender-switch filter, Ethan became Esther ... and essentially launched his own version of To Catch a Predator.

Ethan, a 20-year-old college student from the San Francisco area, wanted to help law enforcement find possible sexual predators on Tinder. Police said Ethan created an account using his filtered photo, claiming to be a 19-year-old girl named Esther. In May, he started chatting with Robert Davies, 40, an officer with the San Mateo Police Department, CBS News reports. They talked on Tinder, then Kik Messenger, and finally Snapchat, and Ethan told Davies that Esther pretended to be 19 in order to use Tinder but was actually 16 years old.

Police said after discussing Esther's age and acknowledging she was a minor, Davies continued to talk about "engaging in sexual activity." Davies gave Ethan enough information for him to figure out his identity, police said, and he tipped off the authorities to what was happening. Last week, Davies was arrested and booked on charges of contacting a minor to commit a felony. Davies is now on paid administrative leave from the San Mateo Police Department, and in a statement, Chief Susan Manheimer said if the alleged conduct is true, it "is in no way a reflection of all that we stand for as a department, and is an affront to the tenets of our department and our profession as a whole."