A restaurant worker who sent explicit messages via the web to what he thought was an underage girl has now been on the run for six months.
Abm Uddin, 39, was on bail awaiting his sentencing at Oxford Crown Court when he disappeared from the restaurant where he was living and working in Goring.
He was last seen leaving Goring railway station on February 28. He has not been seen since that date.
Thames Valley Police confirmed on Thursday (August 31) that Uddin remained at large, with the investigation into his whereabouts ongoing.
READ MORE: Convicted sex offender on the run for six weeks
Uddin failed to appear for his sentencing hearing in March, having previously pleaded guilty to seven counts of attempted sexual communication with children and one charge of attempting to incite a 14-year-old child to engage in sexual activity.
The barrister then prosecuting the case, Charles Ward-Jackson, said that a police officer had called the restaurant worker on February 27 to remind him of the upcoming hearing.
He had not been heard from since, with enquiries uncovering CCTV footage of him leaving Goring railway station on February 28.
Uddin’s colleagues at the restaurant ‘didn’t know where he was going’, the officer told the crown court in March.
The judge, Recorder Samantha Presland, issued an arrest warrant and said: “He definitely scarpered [and] he’s got a week’s head start on everybody.”
She suggested that he was ‘likely to be heading to Bangladesh’, where he has family. Mr Ward-Jackson told the court that Uddin’s brother-in-law, who lives in Islington, had contacted their extended family in Bangladesh. They said they had not heard from the defendant.
Recorder Presland said: “It’s ironic because if he’d actually engaged with probation, then this is the type of thing where he may have got a suspended sentence.”
Following the hearing, Thames Valley Police said enquiries had been made with Border Force and there was no evidence Uddin had left the country.
Investigating officer PC Kate Sherwood of Abingdon police station said: “I am appealing for the public’s help in tracing Uddin, who did not appear at court for his sentencing hearing.
“If anybody sees him, do not approach him, but call Thames Valley Police on 999, quoting reference number 43230106575.”
In February, when he appeared before the court for a plea hearing, Uddin was described as a ‘fairly prolific’ offender.
In the summer of 2021 and then living in Henley, he befriended what he supposed were children online and steered the conversation around to sex.
The ‘girls’ with whom he thought he was talking were, in fact, decoy accounts operated by adults.
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