salon in charge of life

The pedophile I could not help: He was not a monster or a molester. The system destroyed him anyway

I will never forget Jacob. He was an early, twenty-something-year-old young man whom I encountered in my days of working as a research assistant in a sexology lab.

He had all-American looks, with a fresh face and delicate, blond hair. Cheerful and intellectually curious, he was interested in topics like computer programming and machine learning. He wanted to understand the physics of the MRI scanner we used.

He was also a pedophile.

But Jacob had not touched a child. He had contacted whom he thought was a 10-year-old girl in a chat room and made plans to meet up with her. When he arrived, he discovered he had been corresponding with an undercover police officer, and was arrested for luring a minor.