Trans-Identifying Male Sex Offender Arrested For Allegedly Exposing Himself To High School Girls

A male sex offender who last year claimed to be transgender has been arrested for allegedly exposing his genitals to girls in the Washington Liberty High School girls’ locker room.

Richard Kenneth Cox, 58, faces multiple charges in Arlington County, Virginia, including making an obscene display of his genitals in a public place and loitering within 100 feet of a high school after being convicted of a crime that prohibits him from being near minors, WJLA reported. Cox was a Tier III sex offender, required to be on the list for life after exposing his genitals to a child under the age of 14 in the early 1990s.

Cox was arrested at a fitness center on December 6 for trespassing and providing a false identity, Fox 5 DC reported. He also faces charges of indecent exposure and indecent liberties with children after he allegedly exposed his genitals in the women’s locker room at this fitness center on November 30 and December 2. In the December incident, Cox allegedly exposed his genitals when an adult and two children were present.

Some of his current charges also stem from an incident on October 21, 2024, when an unnamed victim entered the girls’ locker room and saw him exposing his genitals. WLHS has an inside pool that is open to the public and managed by Arlington Public Schools, WJLA reported. APS also manages pools at Wakefield High School, where Cox is also alleged to have exposed himself in October and November.

Arlington Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Francisco Durán emailed families Wednesday night, after WJLA first reported the story, and included a statement about keeping an inclusive community.

“We take the safety and trust of our community very seriously,” Durán wrote. “We are fully committed to ensuring our environments and shared spaces balance the need to welcome community members to our pools, from our youngest residents to our most senior, while also maintaining critical safety measures.”

Later in the statement, Durán added that the APS “will continue to foster an inclusive community for all, including those who identify as members of the LGBTQ+ community.”

Durán also noted that the incidents “did not occur during school hours and while part of the same facility, school and pool entrances and exits are separate.”

WJLA reviewed court documents and discovered that Cox announced last year that he was transgender. A woman also told the outlet that she told a manager about Cox using the girls’ locker room in September 2024 but was told Cox was allowed to use that room because he identified as transgender.

In response to a WJLA inquiry, APS said it “permits pool patrons to access restrooms and facilities that correspond to their gender identity.”

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Cox’s sex was listed as male in court documents last year but is now listed as female. In June 2024, he was charged with indecent exposure for allegedly exposing his genitals in the women’s locker room of a Planet Fitness, but that charge was dismissed for unknown reasons.

“Nudity alone is not indecent, or we could not have public locker rooms at all,” Cox wrote in a motion to dismiss the charge against him. “And the question of whether it is indecent for a transgender person to be nude in the locker room that they identify with has also been answered by our courts, our legislatures, and public opinion, and the answer is, No. So whatever it is that my accuser calls ‘indecent,’ other than the anti-trans discrimination that she harbors in her own mind, it has not been and cannot be proven to the court.”

In 1992, Cox was convicted of taking indecent liberties with children in Arlington. The charges stemmed from an incident during which Cox masturbated in front of children in a gymnasium.

In letters he wrote after the conviction obtained by WJLA, Cox acknowledged that he has “compulsions to expose myself in public places.”

Cox is currently in custody at the Arlington County Detention Facility, Fox 5 reported, as authorities continue their investigation.

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