Nicola Sturgeon has been criticised after using female pronouns to describe transgender rapist Isla Bryson.
The First Minister referred to Bryson as "her" and "she" before reverting to calling her an "individual" and a "person".
Bryson was convicted of raping two women while she was a man called Adam Graham and was initially housed in segregation in Cornton Vale prison before being moved to the male estate.
The case sparked outrage in Scotland and led to a temporary ban of violent transgender prisoners being housed in Cornton Vale.
When asked whether Bryson is a woman at Holyrood last week, Sturgeon said: "That individual claims to be a woman; I said that I do not have information about whether those claims have validity.”
She then suggested that she does not believe that Bryson is a woman by appearing to agree with a victim who cast doubt on the transgender claims.
However, in response to a question today about rapists and the process of changing gender, she said: "My comments about her...the person, being a rapist is in context of what should happen to them within the prison service.
"This is a debate about whether this individual should be in a male or female prison, and in my view, what matters there is the nature of the crime and the degree of risk.”
When asked about the use of "her", Sturgeon urged people not to "read anything" into it.
The SNP leader added: "What I'm trying to do is address the issues rather than take it into the kind of, you know, headline generating. I'm trying to rationally deal with these issues.
“What I'm saying is Isla Bryson calls herself a woman, but what I'm trying to say is in the context of the prison service, that is not the relevant factor here. The relevant factor is the crime that the individual has committed.
She continued by saying that "she [Bryson] regards herself as a woman" while adding that “I regard the individual as a rapist."
The Record also revealed how Tiffany Scott, who stalked a 13-year-old girl while known as Andrew Burns, was poised to move to the female estate.
A pause on the housing of transgender inmates with a history of violence against women was enacted, along with an urgent review of the Bryson case.
Tory MSP Rachael Hamilton said: “Nicola Sturgeon has betrayed her true feelings by referring to a double rapist as she.
“It was a telling slip but hardly a surprising one given how the First Minister has tied herself in knots over this issue and repeatedly U-turned.
“Last week Nicola Sturgeon refused to say whether she considered a double rapist to be a man or a woman, despite her justice secretary happily accepting Adam Graham was female the previous day.
“After once again dodging this simple question, she let slip her true position – one which the vast majority of the public will be dismayed at."
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