> A police unit parked outside a guy’s house and confirmed it was him in the real time chatroom, by cutting his internet and seeing him drop off.

I guess I'm going off of too few details probably, but this doesn't seem like a very sound strategy to me. It's certainly not impossible that the real criminal lost internet around the same time as some suspect's was cut by the police. I know I've shown up as online to other people for up to several minutes after losing internet in real-time situations (e.g. games). I suppose police just need "reasonably likely" to take action though, not definite reasons.