HOUSTON – A man was arrested and charged with three counts of sexual assault of a child after detectives say he made arrangements to meet with juveniles through social media.
Hernan Duarte was arrested on Tuesday after Duarte meeting an undercover detectives who he thought was a teen at a local park in The Woodlands, according to Constable Ryan Gable’s detectives.
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KPRC 2 anchor Owen Conflenti spoke to Rania Mankarious, CEO of Crime Stoppers Houston, on Thursday morning to give parents tips on how to protect their children who use social media.
Q: How can we help our children understand the dangers of talking to strangers online and the risks of sharing any person information?
A. The hard part is our kids don’t recognize that these individuals are, in fact, strangers. So the best thing we need to do is raise a generation of gatekeepers, kids who understand the dangers because they’ve seen the stories. This story right here should be shared across dinner tables and Houston in Harris County today. It’s not a conversation we want to have, but we must so that kids can see that not everybody that slides into your DM. Not everybody that asks to be a friend or follows you or praises you, or starts talking to you is actually a good friend or a good person. Or has your good, your best interests at heart? These are really important conversations.
Q: If starting the conversation is the first step, what do we do next?
A. The next step is to realize that this type of activity can happen to any one of our children. That it can happen on any platform. I talk to parents all the time that say, well, I’m really glad my my kids are not on the big, you know, TikTok and Instagram. So it doesn’t matter. Your child can be on a really benign platform as long as they can have access to any stranger, any type of activity can happen. Understand not just what platforms they they’re on, but what the capabilities are within that platform. What your child does, how they use the space. Do they send videos? Do they chat? Are they sending photos? What’s the engagement? No. If your child is sharing their location, whether it’s in their description, their bio, does it say their age, the year at their school and maybe where they live? Talk about what information they’re sending out there in the world. The reason I focus on that one is because a lot of us think, well, I’m going to have time limits put on the phone. I’m going to have parent parental restrictions on the phone. I’m going to make sure my child’s account is private and therefore I can rest easy.
There’s no real technology or software you can place that protects your child. A child can get around most things. A predator can get around those things. The most engaging safety apparatus we have is talking to your child, getting their buy in on that safety, and making sure we’re utilizing safety techniques and steps throughout their online time.
Q: How can I monito their online activity without invading their privacy?
A. You want privacy? Get a diary, write whatever you want in it and slide it under your bed. They were very popular in the 80s. But when you’re on the World Wide Web, when you’re on a platform, a gadget that can connect you to literally anyone, anywhere at any time and expose you to very real dangers that we’re not making up as parents, these are real. And we’re sharing the stories with you kids.
You do not have an expectation of privacy, and we’re not going to allow you to run rampant in that space now. That conversation evolves over time. When you’re giving a child the first their first interaction with technology, there’s zero expectations of privacy. As your children get older, maybe they’re just texting their best friends. I’m not going to go in and read those texts, but I am going to monitor their overall online engagement as best I can. And certainly as they get older. You’re talking about a little later in high school. I am going to give them a little bit more leeway, but by then I’ve raised them to have their own buy in and engagement to be their absolute best gatekeeper. They themselves understand the stakes, and they themselves want to make sure they stay safe.