Edinburgh crime: Driving instructor admits further sex assaults on more 17-year-old girls he was teaching

Findlay Munro placed on a restriction of liberty order for six months

A pervert driving instructor has been snared for sexually assaulting teenage learners for a second time – after more victims came forward following press coverage.

Findlay Munro was placed on the Sex Offenders Register for 24 months last year after he admitted targeting two 17-year-old girls while giving them road lessons in Edinburgh.

Munro, 63, touched and rubbed the girls on the legs and made vile sexual comments to them during driving lessons between December 2020 and August 2021.

Findlay Munro has been placed on a restriction of liberty order for the next six months after admitting new sex offences.

But following press coverage of the attacks, three more female victims then reported Munro’s inappropriate behaviour towards them while he taught them to drive. The instructor was working for the Red Driving School when he sexually assaulted a further two 17-year-old girls and made inappropriate sexual comments to a woman while they drove through several streets in the Capital.

Munro, from Baberton, Edinburgh, pleaded guilty to four sexual offences when he appeared at the city’s sheriff court last month and he was back in the dock for sentencing on Thursday, September 21.

Solicitor Steven Donald, defending, told the court the new offences predated his client’s offences from last year and that he was “making sufficient progress” on his current order. Mr Donald added that Munro, who had been a driving instructor for 11 years, was engaging with the sex offenders rehab programme CISSO and the new cases “arose due to press coverage” of last year’s court case. The lawyer said Munro was currently deemed not fit to carry out unpaid work due to a serious medical condition diagnosed last year.

Sheriff John Cook described Munro’s behaviour as “a breach of trust” and ordered him to be placed on a restriction of liberty order for the next six months. Munro will be forced to wear an electronic tagging device and stay with his home between 7pm and 7am as an alternative to a custodial sentence. Sheriff Cook also placed Munro on the Sex Offenders Register for five years.

Munro pleaded guilty to charges of repeatedly touching a 17-year-old girl on her leg without her consent and assaulting a second teenage victim by touching her leg on various roads in Edinburgh between 2014 and 2016. Munro also caused one of the 17-year-old girls to hear a sexual verbal communication, see a sexual written communication and make inappropriate remarks to her during lessons.

He also admitted to a charge of making comments about her appearance on a social media site between September 2015 and April 2016. Munro also pleaded guilty to making sexual comments to a female learner by making inappropriate comments towards her and commenting on her physical appearance between December 2019 and March 2020.