Arrest made in connection with south Everett sexual assault

Published 4:30 pm Thursday, September 27, 2007

EVERETT – Police have arrested a man in connection with the sexual assault of a 17-year-old girl in south Everett last month.

The man, booked into the Snohomish County Jail for investigation of first-degree rape, was released on $25,000 bail early this morning.

Detectives are working with prosecutors on potential charges, Snohomish County sheriff’s spokeswoman Rebecca Hover said.

Investigators got a break in the case when they learned that DNA collected after the Aug. 19 sexual assault matched DNA from an unsolved 2004 sexual assault in Iowa, Hover said.

Detectives talked with police in Iowa. That information led them to a 33-year-old Everett man, who has lived in Washington for about a year. A search warrant was served at his apartment on Wednesday.

The man’s apartment is in the 800 block of 112th Street SE in Everett. That’s about 12 blocks from where the teenage girl was attacked.

The girl was walking to work on Aug. 19 when she was grabbed by a man armed with a knife. The attacker forced her to the parking lot area of a nearby apartment where she was sexually assaulted.

Investigators have not connected the man arrested Wednesday to an attempted sexual assault that happened Aug. 18. A man grabbed a woman as she was walking in the 12600 block of 8th Ave. W. The suspect fled when the woman’s screams drew neighbors outside.

No additional attacks in the area have been reported to the sheriff’s office, Hover said.

Anyone with information about that incident or the suspect is asked to call the sheriff’s tip line at 425-388-3845.