COUNCIL chiefs in Darlington have warned staff in a leisure centre to be extra-vigilant after a man committed an indecent act in the female changing rooms - the second incident in a year.

A woman was left traumatised after she stripped naked in the Dolphin Centre changing rooms, unaware that a man was watching her and committing the indecent act, last month.

And last night a 23-year-old victim of a similar incident last October in the same changing rooms criticised police for not following up her case.

The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was getting changed alone when a man entered the changing rooms committing an indecent act.

He then asked her to perform a sex act on him. When she started screaming and shouting at him, he said he had only been joking and left.

In last month's incident, a woman told how a man hid around a corner committing an indecent act while people were getting changed.

A Darlington Borough Council spokesman said: "We already have a lot of security in place at the Dolphin Centre. Staff keep an eye out and we have CCTV cameras, although not in the changing rooms for obvious reasons.

"The centre is very busy, with more than a million visitors a year, and things like this happen very rarely.

"But staff have been told to be extra-vigilant, particularly after the incident last month."

But police last night downplayed the more recent incident, saying it was a teenage "peeping tom" and it was not a case of indecent exposure. They are still examining CCTV footage to get the best picture of the teenager leaving the centre.

Police said they did not believe that one man was responsible for both incidents, because the descriptions did not match.

But the earlier victim said last night: "I don't believe the police did enough to try to catch him. I was interviewed by a nice PC, and she took a statement and said Darlington CID would be in touch. But they never called.

"Although people joke about flashers, and I did joke about it afterwards, it was very traumatic at the time. I was very nervous of being in a room along with a man I didn't know for a while afterwards."