White Center rape survivor: He was released to terrorize me

UPDATE: King County Sheriff’s Office detectives confirmed on Thursday that Carranza-Ramirez has returned to Mexico. It is possible for the King County Prosecutor’s Office to extradite him, but according to Q13 News reporter David Rose, this is a very long and time-consuming process.

For a White Center mother who twice survived rape at the hands of the same man, knowing her attacker was behind bars allowed her the chance to begin to heal.

But after Francisco Carranza-Ramirez was released early from jail last week, that sense of safety shattered for Jane (whose name has been changed for her own protection), when he came to her home over the weekend and allegedly assaulted her.

Jane is in a wheelchair and lives with her 2-year-old son. When she heard the judge’s verdict that Carranza-Ramirez would be released on good behavior, she feared that the man who had stalked and sexually assaulted her in front of her child last fall would return to hurt her again.

White Center attack

Just as Jane dreaded, she says he found her and violently attacked her just three days after his release. He allegedly hit her in the face with a long, stick-like object, knocked her out of her wheelchair, and choked her as her son cried nearby.

Thanks to our policies, rapist was free to re-attack victim

Passersby were able to stop him, but he fled the scene before law enforcement arrived. Detectives believe that he is still in the White Center area and are looking for him. He is wanted for second-degree assault, felony harassment, intimidating a witness, and felony violation of a Sexual Assault Protection Order.

Jane told the Dori Monson Show Wednesday that she lives in fear he will return to kill her — and that the King County Prosecutor’s Office and Superior Court effectively put her in that danger. According to court documents, Carranza-Ramirez stated that murdering Jane would “set him free.”

“He is terrorizing me, is what it feels like,” she said. “This never should have happened. This absolutely never should have happened.”

Rape conviction

After Carranza-Ramirez, who was “a complete stranger” to Jane, raped her for the first time last fall, she said that she did not initially report the crime because she was in a state of shock.

But over the next couple of days, Carranza-Ramirez kept stalking her.

When Jane came home from work the day after the crime and was getting her son ready for bed, she heard Carranza-Ramirez at her door again. She said that she locked the door and yelled at him to go away.

The next day, when she was outside with her son walking their dog, Carranza-Ramirez tracked her down and raped her again.

This time, the King County Sheriff’s Office arrested the attacker.

“It was a huge relief for me as soon as they came in,” she said. “I pretty much immediately, once I got to the officer, I vomited and started crying, glad to have it over.”

However, Jane was upset to find that the King County Prosecutor’s Office charged Carranza-Ramirez with rape in the third degree. According to Washington state law, third-degree rape is a class C felony that encompasses date rape, but not violent rape.

“I was very angry and upset when I found out what the initial charge was, and I immediately wrote a letter … disputing [it] and saying why that wasn’t good enough,” Jane said.

The prosecutor’s office told her that they use a conservative filing policy to file lower charges, in the hopes that suspects will plead guilty quicker.

“That in and of itself is so messed up, they should be doing it the opposite way,” she said.

Conditions of release

While he was sentenced to 12 months in jail, King County Superior Court Judge Nicole Gaines Phelps released him for the nearly nine months already served, on the conditions that he would return to Mexico, have no contact with Jane, and register as a sex offender. The court served him with a Sexual Assault Protection Order and ordered him to get on a plane to California on Monday, and then cross the border to Mexico by land.

“They were trusting a mentally ill criminal essentially to just go back to Mexico, and he did not do anything he was supposed to do, he didn’t register as a sex offender, he didn’t get on that plane and leave,” she said. “Instead he chose to come back and terrorize me.”

She does not know whether or not he immigrated here legally, but pointed out that either way, rape is on the list of crimes for which one can be deported.

“If I had been given the chance, I would have contacted immigration myself and had them go to the jail when he was being released,” she said.

A GoFundMe has been set up for Jane to help pay for temporary housing so that she can escape her current location, as well as trauma recovery and child care.

Carranza-Ramirez is a 35-year-old Latino man with long, dark hair that he sometimes wears in a “man-bun.” He is 5-foot-8-inches tall and 140 pounds, with a red and black tattoo on his chest. Detectives ask everyone, especially those in the White Center area, to keep a look out for him. If you see him or have any information as to his whereabouts, call 911 immediately, but do not under any circumstances approach him.

Follow @NicoleKIROFM