Where Is He Now? Chris Hansen Is 67, and Still Up to Quite a Bunch of Stuff

Nineteen years after “To Catch a Predator” ended, Chris Hansen is still running stings, now on his own streaming network. The reason he’s back in the conversation: Robert Pattinson plays him in A24’s “Primetime,” in theaters September 25, and Hansen saw it opening day.

Chris Hansen poses at the Getty Images Portrait Studio during the 2015 Summer TCA’s at The Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills on July 30, 2015. Photo by Tommaso Boddi / Getty Images.

On September 25, TruBlu released the trailer for “I’m Chris Hansen,” a documentary about his career that’s been in the works for 3 years and is being shopped to major streaming services. Hansen’s full reaction to “Primetime” is scheduled to drop at 7 p.m. ET on “Have a Seat with Chris Hansen.” He also brought a crew to the theater to interview moviegoers for his other podcast, “Predators I’ve Caught.”

Chris Hansen at New York Comic Con 2015, where he appeared on a TBS panel at the Jacob Javits Center. Photo by Paul Zimmerman / Getty Images.

Outside a New York theater he called it “so bizarre and so in and out of reality,” adding, “I’m not sure what the point of it was.” He’d spent months objecting to the film, and in August he went to a private A24 screening and left without watching. “The lawyers at A24 wanted me to sign away my rights to my name, image and brand essentially,” he said. “I couldn’t sign that, so they didn’t show me the film.”

Hansen has said he has no personal issue with Pattinson, calling him a “great actor and a nice guy,” and his family thinks the impression is “pretty good.” Years ago, Hansen wrote his own script and wanted Denis Leary to play him.

He says he isn’t seeking a payout from A24. He wants the movie labeled as fiction rather than “inspired by true events,” along with a contribution to organizations that help victims. He hasn’t ruled out legal action and has called the film “identity theft.”

The road here started when NBC didn’t renew his contract in 2013 after 20 years. He crowdfunded a comeback on Kickstarter in 2015, where 1,220 backers pledged $89,068, and “Hansen vs. Predator” premiered in September 2016.

Outside Comedy Central Studios in New York City, Chris Hansen heads out after a visit. Photo by Doug Meszler / WENN.

In January 2019 he turned himself in to Stamford, Connecticut, police over about $13,000 in bad checks for promotional mugs, T-shirts and decals. “I sold a boat to cover the rest of this,” he wrote in an email quoted by police. He paid, the charge was dropped, and later that year he launched the YouTube channel “Have a Seat with Chris Hansen.”

Chris Hansen turns himself in to police in Stamford, Connecticut on January 14, 2019, facing a larceny charge over an allegedly unpaid $13,000 marketing order. Photo by MEGA.

Now he conducts online predator stings through “Takedown With Chris Hansen” on his TruBlu true-crime network, and he bought ads that run before “Primetime.” “Why not direct people to what the real Chris Hansen is doing?” he said.

“Takedown” is in Season 20 and continues to release episodes weekly. A Livingston Parish, Louisiana, operation led to 11 arrests in February 2025, with a new episode from that operation released this week. A San Francisco sting in July and August led to 7 arrests and 5 charges.

Chris Hansen steps outside NBC Studios in New York City in May 2013. Photo by TNYF/WENN.com.

The San Francisco operation is under scrutiny because the sheriff skipped city contract approval and omitted Hansen’s film crew from police reports.

In February, Hansen released “Dangerous Games: Investigating Roblox” on TruBlu. During a child-safety demonstration with YouTuber Schlep at CrimeCon in Las Vegas on May 29, Hansen was banned from Roblox live onstage after a stranger in the game asked whether he had Snapchat.

He also appeared in David Osit’s 2025 MTV documentary “Predators,” which examines the legacy of “To Catch a Predator” and the YouTube vigilantes it inspired. In August, he made the 50-minute special “Sextortion: A Chris Hansen Investigation” free to watch without a subscription. It covers 4 cases in which children died by suicide after being blackmailed online.

Chris Hansen at a “Dateline” anniversary event in New York City on October 4, 2011. Photo by Eugene Gologursky / Getty Images.

Hansen hosts 2 podcasts, “Have a Seat with Chris Hansen” and “Predators I’ve Caught,” sells Cameo videos and has about 680,000 YouTube subscribers. TruBlu costs $4.99 a month or $49.99 a year, and he splits his time among a New York apartment with a podcast studio, a home in West Bloomfield, Michigan, and Cleveland, where the network is based.

He turned 67 on September 13. In August he told the Los Angeles Times, “I’ve got to be the only 66-year-old man in America with 1.1 million TikTok followers.” His wife, Gabrielle Gagnon, makes most of the TikToks.

Hansen and Gagnon married on November 13, 2021, and their 5th anniversary is approaching. His sons from his first marriage are Chase, 34, who runs a production company in Brooklyn, and Connor, 32, a Fox Business correspondent.

On September 21, Hansen announced a 2-book deal with Simon & Schuster for fictionalized thrillers inspired by his cases. The first is due in 2027, with a protagonist who has a different name.

Hansen puts the franchise’s career tally at about 500 arrests. He’s won 10 Emmys, none for “To Catch a Predator.”

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