Timothy Gillette (above).
A quick-thinking mother snapped a cellphone photo of a convicted sex fiend who’d just allegedly molested her young daughter, and rushed it to cops — who tracked the pervert down in less than an hour.
The 41-year-old hero, her 10-year-old daughter and son, 7, were walking down Third Avenue when the creep approached at 4:05 p.m. Monday.
“He passed by, and she said, ‘Mommy, that man touched me!’” the mom said.
“I said, ‘Are you sure?’ She showed me. She put her hand on her crotch and ran it up her body,” the mom told The Post yesterday.
The outraged woman sprang into action.
She tailed the suspect and managed to take a photo from 10 feet away that showed his face. Then she took the incriminating photo to the 13th Precinct station house.
Cops blanketed the neighborhood and spotted Timothy Gillette, 62, lurking nearby at about 5 p.m., sources said.
He was charged with sexual abuse and child endangerment. He’s being held in lieu of $50,000 bail.
Gillette is a registered sex offender, and has served several stretches behind bars.
Authorities say he was arrested on rape charges in 1984 for sex assaults on two girls, who were 7 and 9.
He took a plea in 1986 to two counts of first-degree attempted rape and was released from prison in May 1992.