Match.com
Nothing kills romance like discovering you’ve been flirting with a felon. But now a Los Angeles entertainment executive is taking matters into her own hands by suing the online dating site Match.com after an alleged sexual assault.
A fun and innocent first date with her potential love interest eventually led to a second date that wasn’t so pleasant. According to the woman’s lawyer, Mark L. Webb said she met her alleged assailant last year at Urth Cafe in West Hollywood. He seemed charming and she agreed to see him again. After the second date, however, he allegedly followed her home and forced himself on her.
(More on TIME.com: How to find out if your online date has a dirty past)
“This horrific ordeal completely blindsided me because I had considered myself savvy about online dating safety,” the woman said in a statement released through her lawyer last week. “Things quickly turned into a nightmare, beyond my control.” After the man left, the woman went online and learned that he had been convicted of several counts of sexual battery. Charges are pending in the Match.com case, Webb said.
Robert Platt, an attorney for Match.com, told CBS that it would be impossible for the site to detect and remove him when he signed up. “We don’t have their Social Security numbers,” he said. “It would create so many problems by trying to get background information on all these people.”
The attorney said his client wants Match.com to check members’ names against public sex offender registries and plans to ask the Los Angeles County Superior Court for a temporary injunction barring the site from signing up more Match.com members until his client’s demands are met. “It’s not a guarantee,” he said. “But don’t you think something is better than nothing?”
But unless Match.com adopts such screening measures, try online services like MyMatchChecker.com or Datecheck. (via Los Angeles Times)