Naked rambler Stephen Gough has finally pledged to cover up ending a decade-long campaign of nudity which saw him repeatedly arrested.
The 57-year-old, who has spent much of the last 10 years behind bars, famously fought for his right to go out walking with little more than a smile and a pair of hiking boots.
Now the former Royal Marine, whose naked appearances caused chaos at courts across Tayside, has announced he will wear clothes so that he can take his sick mum out for walks.
He said he would put his naturist beliefs aside to care for 89-year-old Nora after she suffered a stroke.
Speaking just three months after his latest spell in prison, Mr Gough said: “At the moment, what’s appropriate is looking after my mum. She needs 24 hour care.
“If she wants to go for a wander, I’ll get dressed and go with her whatever time it is. Obviously I’m clothed when I’m doing all this. I’d get arrested if I wasn’t and then she’d have no one to look after her.”
He added: “She’s gradually getting worse and I need to be here. I had to respond to what was necessary.”
Mr Gough, who is from Hampshire, has been arrested more than 20 times since he began his naked cross-country rambles in 2003. Prosecutions are said to have cost the public purse hundreds of thousands of pounds.
In July 2009, having spent the last three years in and out of jail, Mr Gough appeared naked at Perth Sheriff Court and was sentenced to a further 12 months for breach of the peace. The court heard he had lasted approximately 30 seconds after his release from Perth Prison before he was arrested again.
He was also sentenced to four months for refusing to dress before the trial.
While behind bars at HMP Perth, Mr Gough was visited by supporters from the French-based Association for the Promotion of Naturism in Liberty.
He appeared in the city’s sheriff court again in February, 2010 where he was sentenced to 21 months his longest sentence to date. In November that year, he was back in the dock and found guilty of conducting himself in a disorderly manner and refusing to wear clothes at the gates of the prison.