THREE men have won their fight to be taken off the sex offenders register.

A man who exposed himself, another who inappropriately grabbed a woman and one who kissed a teenager challenged their inclusion.

They were among a batch of cases considered by judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh.

Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003 a list of offences, such as rape, are specified, which results in a convicted offender being placed on the register.

However, with other crimes, such as breach of the peace, registration can also follow if a court decides there is "a significant sexual aspect".

The Lord Justice Clerk, Lord Gill, said the appeals raised a question over the application of the provisions for those offences not included on the specified list.

The senior judge said if prosecutors were going to argue there was a significant sexual aspect to such an offence then fair notice should be given in the terms of the charge.

Lord Gill said: "Registration as a sex offender is not a sentence. The purpose of registration is not punitive. It is protective.

"It enables the police to keep tabs on a sex offender who is, or who may be, a continuing danger to others, and particularly to women and young people.

"Although registration does not constitute a sentence, it is a grave stigma and one which, designedly, places onerous restrictions and requirements on the registered offender's life.

"In particular, the offender has the public status of sex offender. He is under a continuing obligation throughout the registration period to inform the police of his whereabouts and to notify them whenever he changes address."

The Lord Justice Clerk, sitting with Lord Bracadale and Lord Osborne, ruled in one of the successful appeals they would quash a decision by a sheriff to place Stuart Thomson on the sex offenders register.

Thomson, 24, of Glasgow, admitted assaulting a 25-year-woman by grabbing her while she was waiting for a taxi in Glasgow city centre on June 14, 2009.

The Crown adopted the position he committed an indecent assault but his lawyers said that, while it was drunken and offensive behaviour, he got no sexual gratification from it.

After a sheriff decided he should be subject to notification requirements he challenged the decision, claiming his right to a fair trial under Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights was violated as the Crown failed to give him fair notice it viewed it as an indecent assault. Lord Gill allowed the appeal.

In another case, James Heatherall, 23, won an appeal against his inclusion on the register for five years after exposing himself to a woman in the High Street, in Penicuik, Midlothian, on August 1, 2009.

The Crown accepted a guilty plea by Heatherall, of Loanhead, to a breach of the peace by his exposing himself to the 28-year-old, when he appeared at Edinburgh Sheriff Court.

The woman was leaving a pub when she saw him and was embarrassed.

A sheriff heard he had been with friends and exposed himself as a joke.

He also challenged the decision to put him on the register, claiming there was no significant sexual aspect to the charge he admitted and that his human rights had been breached.

The appeal judges also overturned a decision to put Robert Young, 28, of Cornton Crescent, Bridge of Allan, Stirlingshire, on the sex offenders register for a year after he admitted assaulting a girl on a train between Polmont and Larbert by kissing her on the lips on April 10, 2009, when he appeared at Falkirk Sheriff Court.

Lord Gill said taking into account the nature and purpose of sex offenders registration he did not consider that the sexual aspect could be described as "significant".