A Fife man who sent an explicit picture of himself to a decoy underage girl has avoided a prison sentence.
Connor Webster communicated indecently with the adult from a so-called paedophile hunter group, who was pretending to be a 13-year-old child.
The offending took place between February 15 and 20 last year.
Webster was confronted at his home by members of the group, who streamed it on Facebook.
The Dunfermline 24-year-old has a previous conviction for behaviour of a similar nature.
At an earlier hearing, Webster pled guilty to attempting to cause an older child to view a sexual image and communicating indecently with a person he believed to be a child.
Sheriff Alastair Brown sentenced him to carry out 300 hours of unpaid work as part of a community payback order.
Webster was also placed on the Sex Offenders Register for five years.
Previously, Sheriff Brown had warned Webster his liberty is on “exceptionally thin ice”.
Streamed on Facebook
Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court heard previously a member of the paedophile hunter group had set up a profile in the name of “Isla” on an adult dating site and initially told Webster she was 35 years old.
Procurator fiscal depute Jamie Hilland told the court soon into the conversation, the decoy said she was 13 and it was “cool if you don’t want to chat.”
The fiscal depute said Webster talked about his conversations being sexual.
When “Isla” responded to say she did not know much about that, Webster said he could “teach her but it had to stay between them”.
Webster then asked her for naked pictures.
Mr Hilland said further messages were sent of a sexual nature and on February 18, he sent an explicit picture of himself.
Throughout, the decoy said she was 13 and mentioned being at school.
Previous offence
Mr Hilland said other members of the same vigilante group confronted Webster at his home in July 2021, streaming on Facebook.
At the earlier hearing, defence lawyer David Bell said at the time of the offence Webster was on a deferred sentence for behaviour of a similar nature and had been convicted of communicating with older children.
The solicitor said the latest offence was not a scenario in which Webster sought out people under the age of 16 as he was on an adult site and believed the person he initially engaged with was an adult.
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