A DALRY man who attempted to meet with a person he believed to be a 13-year-old girl for "unlawful sexual activity" has been spared jail.

Scott Simpson was sentenced at Kilmarnock Sheriff Court on Monday, September 16, after previously pleading guilty to five charges in relation to child sexual offences.

Instead of being sent to prison, he was placed on a community payback order with a number of requirements - including a period of unpaid work.

The 27-year-old previously admitted three charges of attempting to communicate indecently with children under 16, one of attempting to meet a child with the intention of engaging in unlawful sexual behaviour,  and one of possessing indecent photographs or pseudo-photographs of children.

His behaviour came to light in March of last year when an investigation was launched by Police Scotland's cybercrime and digital forensics department.

However, one of Simpson's offences - an attempt to communicate indecently with a person claiming to be a boy aged 15 from Preston on October 18, 2022 - was not part of this investigation, with the true identity of this person unknown to the prosecutor.

Despite this, Simpson - of Westpark Wynd - is known to have sent a series of written sexual communications to him, making comments to him about engaging in sexual activity.

During his earlier court appearance, procurator fiscal depute Jaide Podlesny explained that the police investigation saw an undercover officer deployed on an online chat platform, posing as a 13-year-old girl named Hannah King.

The officer connected with a profile operated by Simpson, who said he was 26, and a conversation began.

The fiscal depute said that conversation "immediately took a sexual turn" on Simpson's part.

Conversations continued over a number of days and moved away from the online chat platform to social media site Snapchat.

Ms Podlesny told the court that Simpson made arrangements to meet up with the 'child' "for sexual activity".

She said: "The accused advised that he would attend in a McDonald’s restaurant in Partick and collect the child in his vehicle."

Police went to the West End Retail Park in Glasgow on March 14 and Simpson confirmed to the chat profile that he had arrived and was waiting near the entrance.

However, after a search, officers found no trace of Simpson's vehicle and were later stood down.

Enquiries continued and later revealed that the Dalry man was also exchanging messages with someone he believed to be a 15-year-old female.

The court was told that Simpson made sexual comments referring to the child's bra size, and made reference to himself being her “secret boyfriend double your age”.

Police, with a search warrant, went to Simpson's home on March 22 and found a mobile phone before arresting him.

An examination of the phone found indecent still images of children, sourced from the internet.

A total of 20 photographs were found, with the most extreme depicting rape and sexual exploitation of children.

Officers also recovered Snapchat conversations between Simpson and the second teenage girl - who called themselves Erin, on January 23 and 24 last year in which Simpson asked the 'child' about their previous sexual experience.

In one message read out to the court, Simpson said: “15-year-old virgin sounds perfect to me.”

The account was traced to an address owned by a witness - who was in fact an adult male - who identified themselves as the owner of a Snapchat account when visited by police.

The witness confirmed he was responsible for the 'Erin' profile and said he had pretended to be a 15-year-old girl in a bid to identify adult males looking to speak to young girls.

After being granted bail following his previous appearance, Simpson returned to court to be sentenced this week.

He was placed on a community payback order which will include social work supervision for a period of three years and programme and conduct requirements lasting the same duration.

The 27-year-old was also ordered to complete 300 hours of unpaid work - the maximum amount of hours which the court can impose - over the next 12 months.

He will also be placed on the sex offenders register for the next three years.