How law enforcement is promoting a troubling documentary about 'sextortion'
Law enforcement officials around the U.S. are sponsoring screenings of a new documentary film that warns parents about the dangers of sexually coercive crimes online. Dozens of organizations, including local police departments, universities, a film festival, the Pentagon and a U.S. attorney's office, have lent the film credibility by hosting screenings. Two other U.S. attorney's offices promoted the film in news releases.
Sextortion: The Hidden Pandemic describes what the filmmakers refer to as "the fastest-growing crime in the world that nobody knows about" and that is "1,000 times more prevalent than sex trafficking."
"When you first face this kind of crime, you have a natural aversion to it. But then you realize: Oh my gosh, this could be happening to, well, at first we thought thousands — now we know it's millions of children," said Maria Peek, one of the documentary's filmmakers, at a screening at the University of Southern California in October 2022.
The film features federal and local prosecutors, as well as Homeland Security Investigations agents, describing a serious crime against children that they believe is on the rise. But it also contains claims disputed by other experts in the field and an emphasis on large statistics that experts say muddle the scale and scope of the problem. NPR has learned that the filmmakers and the film's promotional materials misrepresented cooperation with the Department of Justice.
The project comes from filmmakers Stephen and Maria Peek, whose past work includes a documentary about a teenage dance troupe and a collaboration with a notorious antisemite and conspiracy theorist who believes that alien, shape-shifting "reptoids" control world events.
The film focuses on the dangers of trusting strangers online. But it appears that law enforcement officials and other experts featured in the film were unaware of the filmmakers' past work giving a platform to a conspiracy theorist.
Experts on child sex abuse and human trafficking tell NPR that the film could leave viewers with an incomplete and exaggerated portrait of this threat to minors. They fear the film's portrayal of the crime could hinder harm reduction efforts by skewing public perception and even fueling conspiracy theories about rampant child victimization.
