People in this thread have extremely optimistic expectations of the police. In this country at least, the police don't protect poor people, kids or no. It's not what they're spending their time doing.
I mean, rolling down the window offering candy to strangers is the literal textbook example of a 70s predator, so it’s extremely suspicious. Hand out candy while walking and it won’t be that bad.
It's a comical stereotype of a pedophile that it's almost laughable that police took it seriously. I wonder what came out of that "disorderly conduct" charge, because what did he do other than remind someone of a stereotype?
Maybe not arrested, but you are pretty likely to have an unpleasant interaction with the police at a minimum if you're walking up to kids and asking them to come with you. Honestly the best way to do this (as in least likely to interact with the police) in the U.S. would be to hire actors -- which would feel awfully scummy to me, but that's honestly the safest way to do it.
Now, if it asked you to buy some pizzas and just hand them to some less fortunate kids, you could probably do that without interacting with the police. You'd still need to be careful, but it could probably be done.
it's unfair but a woman may be able to pull this off with kids that live on her street with parents she's at least waved at. A man? not so much, and the police will definitely be engaged.
