9 Investigates: Homeless sex offender in Osceola County

A sex offender who was evicted from an Osceola County homeless camp said his probation officer told him to sleep in a The Home Depot parking lot since he had nowhere else to go.

For the past two nights, deputies found the man sleeping in the parking lot.

“I was scared, I mean, I was panicked,” he said. “I told them just my probation officer told me to stay here, and I didn’t cause any harm. I was just sleeping.”

The man, who is a registered sex offender convicted of possessing child pornography, said he was evicted from a homeless camp off of Old Vineland Road earlier this week.

The man claims his probation officer, Elizabeth Clegg, instructed him to remain in The Home Depot parking lot from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.

Despite it being private property, he said he won’t go anywhere else.

“If I just stay here and I get kicked out, I end up in jail,” he said. “But if I do what others say and just leave, then I still end up in jail because of probation. So either way I still feel like I’m going to get caught.”

Clegg’s office declined to comment, but a Department of Corrections spokesman said probation officers don’t instruct sex offenders where to stay.

The spokesman said the offender chose to live in the parking lot and that Clegg wrote down the address for him.

The man said he was told to update is license to reflect that he’s living in the parking lot.

A The Home Depot spokesman said the company wasn’t aware of the situation but will now investigate it.