Courtesy of Edwardsville Police Department
EDWARDSVILLE — A lifetime registered sex offender wanted on allegations he followed a girl and exposed himself to her inside a store at the Gateway Shopping Center was captured Tuesday night.
John Wynn Gittens, 66, was captured by Edwardsville police on an arrest warrant charging him with indecent exposure, open lewdness, disorderly conduct and failure to register with the state police.
The warrant was issued for Gittens on Feb. 22 after an investigation by Officer Michael Lehman.
According to the criminal complaint:
A father of a girl called police on Feb. 22, reporting he was shopping with his family at the store. When they returned home, his daughter told him about a man who followed her inside the store and exposed himself.
Police obtained surveillance footage from inside the store that identified Gittens.
Police went to Gittens’ registered address at 947 W. Market St., Kingston, finding it condemned.
Gittens is a lifetime sexual offender due to an indecent assault conviction in 2001.
The complaint alleges Gittens failed to update his address as a lifetime registrant after the registered West Market Street residence was condemned.
Gittens was arraigned on the charges by District Judge Joseph Carmody of West Pittston and jailed at the Luzerne County Correctional Facility for lack of $50,000 bail.
In an unrelated case, Gittens was sentenced on April 4, 2022, by Judge Joseph F. Sklarosky Jr. to six-to-24 months at the county correctional facility on allegations he exposed himself to a mother and her daughter in the parking lot of a business on Hanover Street, Wilkes-Barre, on on Feb. 27, 2021.
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