Man uses gay dating app for attempted robbery
A US study showed high rates of domestic violence among male couples
A man has been charged with robbery, criminal impersonation and vandalism after he arranged to meet a man on a gay dating app.
Desmond Clements, 28, from Atlanta, who reportedly already has an extensive criminal background, arranged for the other man to come to his house to meet him.
The pair had met through gay dating app Jack’d, which works in a similar way to Grindr. Users are shown 300 eligible men that are close to them on an interface.
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When the man arrived at his house, Clements demanded $100 from him. However, when the man said he didn’t have the money, Clements jumped into the car and “honked the horn repeatedly stating he had friends with guns inside”, according to the Tennessean.
He then drove the man to an ATM where he demanded he withdraw the required amount of money, and said he would keep damaging his car until he was done. He then keyed the man’s car.
When the man went to the ATM, he told a witness that he was being robbed. They called the police, who arrived and arrested Clements.
Clements is now in a Nashville jail on an $11,500 bond.
The affidavit says that while being transported to jail, Clements started to laugh, and told officers: “You don’t even have the real me, because that isn’t me.”
He then gave them his real name, upon which they soon learned that there was already a warrant out for his arrest in Georgia.
Like Grindr, users can check out men based on their location. It has an estimated 5 million users across the world, spanning 180 countries.
This is not the first time a gay dating app has been used to commit a crime. In 2016, Stephen Port, from London, was found guilty of murdering three men that he had met through different accounts.
Earlier this year, police in the US were investigating a series of assaults that happened after the attackers arranged to meet men through dating apps.
