NEW HARTFORD – A registered sex offender was arrested Tuesday after police received reports of a man committing a lewd act in a vehicle in the Consumer Square parking lot.

Stephen J. Kuznia III, 65, of Utica, was charged with one count of public lewdness, a misdemeanor.

Officers responded to a call at Consumer Square on Sept. 11, 2019, from a woman who described the suspect and gave the police the license plate of the vehicle. Police say there were several similar incidents in that area from a man matching Kuznia’s description. The reports, combined with the license plate number, lead police to Kuznia.

This is not the first time Kuznia was suspected of committing lewd acts in public. He was accused of public lewdness in multiple parking lots along Commercial Drive in the fall of 2017.

Kuznia is due back in the Town of New Hartford Court next month.

According to the Division of Criminal Justice Services, Kuznia ended up on the registry after he was convicted of sexually assaulting a woman while threatening her with a knife in January of 1995. He was sentenced to 11 to 22 years in state prison on charges of deviate sexual intercourse and kidnapping/unlawful imprisonment.