By Jeff Goldman
NJ.com
EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP, N.J. — A pair of YouTubers who pose as underage teenagers online to try to catch child predators provided video and transcripts that helped Egg Harbor Township police separately arrest two men on luring charges this week, officials said.
Both of the YouTubers’ meetings with men expecting to meet underage teenagers for sex took place on Sunday, Egg Harbor Township police said.
At about 8 p.m., the YouTubers met up at a local motel with the 53-year-old man there to see a 15-year-old boy, Egg Harbor Township police said.
The YouTubers recorded their conversation with the man — Raymond Effinger, Jr., of Hammonton — before he fled in a car, officials said.
Effinger turned himself in on Wednesday after previous attempts to get him to surrender failed, police said Thursday. Effinger was then sent to the Atlantic County jail.
A little more than two hours earlier on Sunday, the YouTubers had called township police to a boat slip at Graef’s Boat Yard on Longport Boulevard. That’s where Roger Tomes, 57, of Philadelphia, invited someone he thought was a 15-year-old girl to have sex on his boat, authorities said.
Police arrested Tomes after the YouTubers turned over explicit text messages and online messages they had compiled while in online contact with Tomes as they posed as the teenage girl.
Tomes was also charged with luring, police said Tuesday.
BreakingAC.com identified the YouTubers as Cameron Decker and Shafiq Blake.
Anyone with additional information is asked to email CID@ehtpd.com or call Crime Stoppers at 609-652-1234 or 800-658-8477. The Crime Stoppers Website can be visited at http://www.crimestoppersatlantic.com/. Crime Stoppers offers cash rewards for information leading to the arrest and indictment of those who commit crimes in Atlantic County.
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