Police refuse to arrest pedocriminal doctor.

Vigilantes criticised police for refusing to arrest a suspected pervert doctor during a Facebook live sting, despite showing evidence he allegedly tried to groom a 12-year-old girl.

Silent Justice claim the 22-year-old man sent naked selfies to one of their adult decoys – posing as a child online – and arranged to meet for sex in his car.

The group said they swooped on his home in Oldham, Greater Manchester, ahead of the meeting after he told them he was a doctor working closely with children.

They surrounded the property on Sunday evening and dialled 999 but when officers arrived they refused to make an immediate arrest because there was ‘no-one at risk at the moment’.

The vigilantes argued the suspect posed an imminent danger to children he came into contact with at work and warned he might destroy vital evidence if not arrested.

They showed police explicit messages and photos he allegedly sent their decoy, linked to his mobile phone via WhatsApp.

But officers insisted it was against ‘protocol’ to investigate without taking a formal statement at a police station and urged them to leave the scene.

A 90-minute stand-off followed as concerned neighbours joined in calls for the suspect to be arrested.

He was eventually detained after the lead vigilante agreed to make a statement at a nearby station.

Footage of the clash was streamed live to Facebook and has been viewed more than 180,000 times.

It shows Silent Justice members arguing with police.

The leader of the group offers to make a full statement after the arrest ‘like we do every time’ but a female officer tells him: ‘It doesn’t work like that.’

She says: ‘Do you not think that we like to arrest people like that? But we need to get evidence first.’

Stunned, he responds: ‘I’ve got all the evidence here. I’ve just said to you I’ve got the evidence here.’

He shows her photographs of the suspect and urges her to go to the address and question him.

She refuses, saying: ‘How do I know who sent that message? That could be anybody.

‘It’s all right you telling me to arrest somebody but I need to have the grounds to arrest that person.’

He points at his phone in disbelief and says: ‘Is that not evidence there, clearly with pictures of his penis?’

He then turns to a male officer and says: ‘I’m asking you now, will you go and arrest this man?’ He replies: ‘Not off your say-so, no.’

The vigilante says: ‘Greater Manchester Police, given them the evidence, given them the perpetrator, they refused the evidence.’

The suspect is later escorted from the property by an officer and locked in the back of a police van.

He was arrested on suspicion of inciting sexual activity with a child and bailed pending investigation.

Chief Superintendent Neil Evans, of Greater Manchester Police, said the force would be reviewing its response to see if lessons can be learned.

He said: ‘At the time this call came in, officers from Oldham were dealing with ten other serious incidents which required an immediate response.

‘On refusal of leaving the location without enforcement, a crew of officers was allocated to the informant’s location in order to keep the peace and further advise that an official report needed to be made in the form of a statement.

‘As soon as the necessary resources became available they were deployed to the scene where a 22-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of inciting sexual activity with a child.

‘I understand this video has caused concern to some who have seen it and I would like to assure those people that.

‘We will be reviewing our response to see if we can learn from it and improve our service.

‘I would like to make it clear that we take all reports of sexual offences extremely seriously.’

A spokesman said at 2pm today: ‘The 22 year old man arrested has been released under investigation.’