I recently moved to a new State and I was excited to get started with a DND group my age (I'm 29 years old). I spent several weeks looking for a group and I found one at my local store. The group was fluctuating between 7 and 6 players, all of them required to be 18 , a rule set by the DM. We play for 5 months and I have put a lot of thought into my character, and I was liking all of the other characters and their flaws; and the people that played them I thought they were cool too even if we all bumped heads now and again. I tolerated and worked with people's flaws and figured it was all part of the process. I start developing a friendship outside of the game, with the DM, the goth girl of the group, and an overweight autistic dude (but I assumed we were all friends as a group collective.) Fast forward to Sunday this week. I'm told that the DM has some personal drama going on and for the past 2 weeks we have been canceling every Sunday (the days we meet). Autistic guy says he can't give me the full details but it is very serious, and hopes DND can still continue. I wake up the next day and the goth girl tells me DM's dirty fucking secret. DM is a level 3 sex offender; he was a teacher who took pics of a girl's underwear, that's why we haven't been able to DND. Keep in mind, DM is in his late 40s, and as a side note has been trying to socialize and be "close friends" with the women adults in our group in their 20s. I mentally go into crisis management mode, and try to make sure everyone is okay and see if I can still keep my DND group with me as Dungeon Master. I ride around with autistic guy, trying to get what campaign notes from the sex offender DM 🤢, not a fun experience to still act friendly to the sick fuck for diplomacy sakes, but i managed to get the dnd notes. For some fucking reason, the autistic guy is still trying to be friends with the DM even after this shit has come out! Whatever, I have an appointment with one of the players of our group tomorrow to have coffee and see if he is still interested in playing with me as DM. After I meet with the player I get a grim picture. Nobody wants to associate with people that knew the DM unless they were already close friends. The only person that I know for certain is interested in me continuing the story is the autistic guy and the goth girl is on the fence. I'm also leaving out some details, the whole group this entire time has had insider drama and everyone seems to hate the autistic guy except for the goth girl. The autistic guy and goth girl have been trying to control narratives and lies to make themselves look innocent. The only decent person was the guy I met for coffee who advised me to stay the fuck away from everyone in a kind way, start over and try to find a different group. Turns out the decent guy just didn't think our personalities mesh along with other people in our group, but didn't think badly of me, but didn't want to be near the autistic guy again. So now I treat the whole group like they're radioactive and keep my distance.

Tldr: my DM is a class 3 sex offender, we all stay away from each other due to personality clashes and traumas.

PS: I have been playing DND for 4 years and I am disillusioned with the game. I no longer feel like I can trust people in general anymore and I feel inadequate for me not picking up on the signs. I think I'm going to quit DND and just stick to video games and writing a novel for creative ideas. I'm starting to fucking hate people