SUSPECTED murder victim Geoffrey Reed was a convicted sex offender who had been locked up for his crimes.

The 57-year-old Boscombe man, last seen eight days ago, attacked a 16-year-old girl in his car after offering her a lift and driving to a secluded car park. And he was later prosecuted twice for failing to comply with the Sex Offenders’ Register.

Reed, formerly of Cartwright Close, Kinson, appeared at Bournemouth Crown Court in December 1997, where Judge Samuel Wiggs heard how he had taken his victim to a car park in the town’s Meyrick Park and tried to force himself on her.

Reed was jailed for six months.

He later moved to a ground-floor flat in Cecil Road, Boscombe, where he was living with three other men and a woman before his disappearance.

Earlier this week a murder investigation was launched following the discovery of human remains in a wooded area of Lytchett Matravers, north of Poole.

Three men – Stuart Raymond Wareham, 25, from Bournemouth, Lee Raymond Wareham, 32, of no fixed address, and Benjamin Henry Walter, 21, of no fixed address – are due to appear at Bournemouth Magistrates Court this morning charged with the murder of Geoffrey Reed.

In March 1998, in the first case of its kind in Dorset, Reed, then 43, was brought before magistrates in Bournemouth for failing to register as a sex offender.

A law introduced in September 1997 required him to register within 14 days of conviction.

Then married and working as a kitchen porter at the Bridge House Hotel in Longham, Reed was given a 12-month conditional discharge, despite a possible maximum penalty of six months in jail and a £5,000 fine.

In July 1999, Reed was fined £250 and ordered to pay £50 costs by Wimborne magistrates for failing to register his details with the police.

He told the court he had forgotten to notify his change of address. And in March 2001 he was jailed for one month for a similar offence.

Dorset Police have refused to discuss Reed’s past and will not confirm or deny that his criminal past forms part of the current investigation.

A spokesman said: “We would never comment on whether somebody has, or has not, got a criminal record. We would not comment on what officers are currently investigating either."

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