Primetime: Chris Hansen and His Controversial Predator-Hunting Show, Explained

Last week, the Internet was stunned when the trailer for Primetime, a movie about Chris Hansen and his infamous predator stings, dropped.

Once again, Robert Pattinson proved himself a dynamic character actor as he adopted Hansen’s mannerisms and even quoted his famous line: “You see how this looks, right?”

While Hansen has been widely praised for his work capturing paedophiles, winning 10 Emmy Awards during his TV career, he was also at the centre of a lot of controversy, with many questioning the ethics surrounding his operations, which, arguably, paved the way for a lot of the amateur stings we see online today.

So, to learn more about the story behind Primetime, keep reading. Please be aware that due to the subject matter, this piece contains references to child sexual abuse, as well as suicide.

What Is To Catch A Predator?

To Catch A Predator was a widely popular segment on Dateline NBC between 2004 and 2008. In conjunction with Perverted-Justice, an online organisation dedicated to catching and documenting child predators, accused paedophiles would essentially be lured to a sting house where they believed they were going to meet a minor. They were lured by Perverted-Justice volunteers who, in online chats, pretended to be children or teenagers. 

There would be a hidden camera set-up in the house for when the person arrived and Chris Hansen revealed himself to directly confront the accused. These suspects would often end up arrested as part of these sting operations. A total of 12 undercover sting operations were aired across 20 episodes. 

Why Did To Catch a Predator End?

While Chris Hansen claimed in a Time interview that the show simply ran its course in 2008, it is widely believed that the end of the show was linked to the death of one of the ‘predators’ they pursued — district attorney Bill Conradt. 

In July 2006, Perverted-Justice, To Catch A Predator, and the Murphy, Texas police department set up a joint sting operation. After a few months of preparation, several stings took place in November of that year. During the four-day sting, 25 men were caught when they arrived at the property. However, there were other men investigated who didn’t attend, one of those being Conradt. He had been talking and sent a sexually explicit photo to a Perverted-Justice volunteer pretending to be a 13-year-old boy. 

When Conradt didn’t arrive for the meeting he and the ‘boy’ arranged, the police and Dateline NBC went to his home. When a SWAT team and camera crew entered his house, Conradt shot himself in the head — with the moment being captured by cameras. While this was never aired on TV, Dateline did air forensic findings from Conradt’s computers, laptops, CDs and cell phones in September 2007. These devices purportedly all had porn and CSAM on them, although Esquire challenged this claim in 2009.

Two days after this was aired, ABC News magazine 20/20 aired an investigative report into Dateline NBC and To Catch A Predator, in which two former Texas police officers spoke out against the Conradt situation. Later that year, Conradt’s estate, which was led by his sister, sued Dateline for $105 million. They later settled out of court in June 2008, although the amount settled for is not known. That same year, To Catch A Predator was cancelled.

What Did Chris Hansen Do After To Catch A Predator?

The format was rebooted twice: first as Hansen vs Predator on syndicated TV show Crime Watch Daily in 2015, and then on his own true-crime-oriented streaming service TruBlue, with the web series Takedown with Chris Hansen in 2022.

He also started a YouTube channel in 2019 entitled Have A Seat With Chris Hansen, where, most notably, he interviewed several people as part of a series investigating once-popular YouTuber Greg ‘Onision’ Jackson. He also interviewed people on his channel as part of an investigation into Dahive Vanity, including Damien Leonhardt, who was identified as “victim zero” and who, as a child, was at the centre of a high-profile cyberbullying case in 2010.

He has also been involved in documentaries about Jackson and convicted sex offender Peter Nygård, and most recently, on TruBlu, released a documentary about YouTuber Schlep, who was banned from Roblox after conducting sting operations on alleged predators on the platform.

What Will Primetime Cover?

The official logline of the movie is as follows: "In 2006, To Catch a Predator host Chris Hansen sets out to make television history." Based on that, it's clear that Primetime is set to cover the most controversial year in the show's history: the Texas stings that ultimately led to the segment's demise.

Based on the trailer, it looks like the movie will also chart To Catch A Predator's rise and subsequent fall from grace. In one scene, the NBCUniversal boss tells Hansen that To Catch A Predator will be moving to 9 pm primetime, which leads to Pattinson (as Hansen) proclaiming: "I'll be bigger than Lost!"

This has led to speculation that the movie will take inspiration from the 2025 documentary Predators, which casts an arguably critical eye over Hansen and To Catch A Predator's operations.