(Dateline NBC)
NBC News doesn't seem much concerned with an irony-clad scandal that appears to be enveloping one of its "Dateline NBC" correspondents.
The network personality in question is Chris Hansen, best known for entrapping pedophiles on the erstwhile MSNBC reality series "To Catch a Predator."
Now, after shaming many an alleged pervert in hidden-camera sting operations, Hansen has allegedly been caught on video cheating on his wife.
The National Enquirer claims to have footage of the 51-year-old Connecticut resident and father of two wining and dining Kristyn Caddell, an anchor at a West Palm Beach, Fla., NBC affiliate station.
The full Enquirer story is not available online, but the U.K.'s Daily Mail recaps some of the details: "Last weekend he was recorded taking Miss Caddell on a romantic dinner at the exclusive Ritz-Carlton hotel in Manalapan, before spending the night at her Palm Beach apartment. Secret cameras filmed the couple as they arrived at the hotel for dinner and then drove back to her apartment--where the pair left, carrying luggage, at 8 am the following day."
Reached for comment, an NBC News spokeswoman said: "We don't comment on National Enquirer stories."
The brusque remark seems meant to undermine the lurid supermarket tabloid's credibility. But the Enquirer's Hansen item recalls another infamous case of celebrity infidelity that the tabloid successfully unearthed: John Edwards' affair and love child with campaign videographer Rielle Hunter.
When the Enquirer put forth the earliest rumblings of that scandal in 2007, Edwards--and the national media--dismissed the reports.
But the Enquirer stuck with the story, which turned out to be true and ultimately brought about the end of Edwards' political career. The paper was later floated as a potential Pulitzer contender for its reporting.