FAIRFAX, Va. (7News) — Registered sex offender Richard Cox will be in court again for a hearing in Arlington next month, where he faces more than 20 charges for allegedly exposing himself in women’s locker rooms.

In an interview with 7News, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin called out Fairfax County leaders for not charging Cox for allegedly doing the same thing at several women’s locker rooms in Fairfax County.

“I believe Fairfax County should think long and hard about some of the decisions they're making,” said Youngkin.

7News was the first to report that Cox allegedly exposed himself in women’s locker rooms at three Fairfax County rec centers between August and November last year.

When he visited Fairfax County rec centers, Cox claimed he was transgender.

A Fairfax County police report from 2024 said Descano’s office told police there were no criminal elements for a charge for his visits to county rec centers.

Last summer, Descano’s office also didn’t prosecute Cox after a woman claimed Cox exposed himself to her in a Planet Fitness locker women’s room in Seven Corners.

Descano’s office told 7News they don’t prosecute pro se criminal cases, which is when someone chooses to represent themselves.

Meanwhile, Arlington County is pressing charges against Cox for allegedly exposing himself in women’s locker rooms at a county fitness center and two schools that have pools open to the public.

“Thank goodness we have a Commonwealth attorney in another county that is willing to press charges and should,” Youngkin told Minock. “This person should be locked up and they should never be allowed to go into the other genders locker room. This is an underpinning to, I believe, a big challenge broadly in Fairfax County, you have policies that families don't like, you actually continue to support the criminal over the victims. You're running large deficits, and yet the only way to approach your reconciliation with that is to raise taxes even further. And you're already one of the highest tax jurisdictions in the state, and you wonder why you are the largest county for net outmigration. There are consequences for these kinds of decisions. People vote with their feet, and I see more folks in Northern Virginia moving than any place else in Virginia. And in fact, we have just for the first time in a decade at the state level, seen more people move to Virginia on a net basis than move away for a decade, and I firmly believe it's because they want to live here. They want to raise their families here. But I believe Fairfax County should think long and hard about some of the decisions they're making, which are so counter to those underpinnings, where people feel safe, where businesses want to be, and most importantly where folks want to build their future.”

“Sex offenders we arrest,” Arlington County Board Chair Takis P. Karantonis told Minock. “We react fast. Sex offenders should not [be in] any way close to the population that they’re restricted to be close to, kids in particular.”

The Arlington County Board Chair told 7News that Cox is currently in the Arlington jail.

“Sex offenders belong to the jail,” said Karantonis. “That is where we bring them.”

Like Fairfax County, Arlington allows people to use bathrooms and locker rooms based on their gender identity at schools and county facilities.

“We are listening and we have policies that are also consistent with our human rights basic ordinance,” said Karantonis.

HOW 7NEWS LEARNED ABOUT THE INCIDENTS

Concerned mothers and women reached out to 7News about Cox allegedly exposing himself in the girls’ locker room at Washington-Liberty High School last year and they fear this could happen again because of how the pool manager and the Arlington School Board handled the situation.

Before Cox was charged in October, a woman told 7News that she told the pool manager about the situation in September 2024, but she said the manager allowed Cox to continue to use the girl’s locker room because he identified as transgender. The woman said she called the school board and reported the situation, but the Arlington School Board did not respond to her.

The mother told Minock she was very concerned about what happened. She said she and her 9-year-old daughter walked into the girls' locker room after swim lessons at Washington Liberty High School on Sept. 9, 2024, and saw Cox naked in the girls' locker room.

She said she spoke to the manager on duty.

“He casually mentioned that this had been going on since summer," the mother said.

She said she also emailed the Arlington Public Schools Aquatic Center Director, but received no response.

The mother said she spoke to Arlington County School Board Member Mary Kadera about the situation in September 2024 and Kadera’s solution was to add signage encouraging people to be considerate of others, to cover private parts in locker rooms, and to observe locker room etiquette.

In February, 7News emailed Kadera asking why that was her solution – instead of calling the police immediately. Kadera didn’t respond.

Cox continued to use the girls’ locker room into late October 2024, according to police.

In September 2024, the Arlington mother 7News spoke with said she didn’t know she and her daughter were sharing a locker room with a sex offender.

“My daughter finished her first day at swim class at Washington Liberty High School, and we finished class, we walked into the women's locker rooms, and immediately, as we turned the corner, we saw an individual who was an individual man, as I saw it in the women's locker room, completely naked, facing the doorway. So we walked in to see a man changing in the women's locker room,” the Arlington mother told 7News.

“Were there other women and girls in that locker room too when that happened?” Minock asked the Arlington mother.

“There had to have been at least a dozen other small girls and moms scattered about the room,” she said.

“How did that make you feel as a mother?” Minock asked.

“I felt sort of trapped,” she answered. “I felt like in my head, my priority was [to] get my daughter changed out of her wet clothes, and I wasn't sure where else to go, so I took her over to the corner of the room, covered her with a towel, changed her as quickly as I could, and we left, and we left the facility as fast as we could. We sat in the car for a bit after and she talked about how she just couldn't stop seeing it, and that I felt terrible for her. She's never seen that before, and definitely not in a place that she felt was safe for her to change in.”

A TIMELINE OF INCIDENTS LOCALLY