A man missing in Fife for three weeks was a sex offender awaiting sentencing for making a threatening phone call.
Police issued a missing persons appeal to trace Leo Stewart on July 27 but no mention was made of his offending behaviour or the fact he had been placed on the sex offenders register in 2016.
Stewart, from Methil, was previously jailed for 12 months for flashing at two people including a 13-year-old girl. He will be sentenced at Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court on November 28 for making a threatening phone call to a woman.
Police said they had taken the advice of the Crown office in failing to warn the public that they had lost contact with the 22-year-old.
A Crown Office spokesman said: “Requests by police to issue images, CCTV or press releases are very carefully considered by Crown Counsel, including taking into account any risk to the public, before making any decision on how to proceed.”
Stewart was eventually traced by police in Kirkcaldy on August 16. The force issued a short statement yesterday to say he had been found.
He will be sentenced in November for making a phone call to a woman which was grossly offensive and of a menacing character.
He threatened to have unnamed people go to her home and made threats of violence towards her.
The offence happened on October 17 last year, when Stewart was a prisoner at Perth.
In October 2016, Stewart was found guilty of exposing himself to two females, one a 13-year-old schoolgirl, in separate incidents which occurred in Kirkcaldy in broad daylight.
The young girl was so shocked and upset that she went home and locked the door until her mum returned. Stewart made obscene comments to both victims.
He was also convicted of being in possession of a Stanley knife after a four day trial at Dunfermline Sheriff Court.
His initial sentence was a community payback order with 30 months supervision, with restrictions relating to contact with children, and he was placed on the sex offenders register.
Stewart was later jailed for 12 months after appealing against a 36 month prison sentence imposed for repeatedly breaching community payback orders in relation to the indecency offences.
Reducing the sentence, Lord Glennie said: “There is nothing in the way the charges are set out in the indictment or in the manner in which they are described by the sheriff in his report to suggest that these were other than isolated incidents or random acts of sexual exhibitionism.”
