A GREENOCK man sent indecent and sexually explicit messages to underage girls, it is alleged.

Dean Footit, 31, is facing a total of four charges relating to claimed offences that he is said to have committed around two years ago.

Prosecutors say that Footit uttered indecent remarks towards a young girl, who was in her early teens at the time, in March 2022.

According to the Crown, he did this 'intentionally and for the purposes of obtaining sexual gratification or of humiliating, distressing or alarming' the alleged victim.

Footit is charged with sending the same youngster a video of him performing a solo sex act between October and November 2022 and intentionally causing the girl to look at a sexual image.

READ MORE: Man in court charged with sexually assaulting five women over almost a decade

It is alleged that he was on five separate sheriff court bail orders at the time.

Footit also sent messages of an indecent nature to a different young girl, who was the same age as the first alleged victim, on various occasions, prosecutors claim.

On November 7, 2022, Footit is said to have sent further indecent messages and a sexually explicit photo to someone he believed to be the same young girl but who is said to have been an adult who was pretending to be the child.

Footit, represented by solicitor Aidan Gallagher, appeared from custody to deny the alleged offences at Greenock Sheriff Court.

The court was told that a VIPER (video identification parade electronic recording) procedure was still outstanding for some of the witnesses involved in the case.

Sheriff James Varney continued proceedings to a further hearing on June 11.