A sex offender whose electronic ankle monitor died while on community supervision after convictions for raping a child picked up where he left off in Oregon and Washington, prosecutors said.
James Harrison Newcomer, 27, of Washington, is now accused of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl twice in Woodburn in April and two other girls in Washington state, ages 15 and 16, in February after meeting them on Snapchat before he was rearrested on June 7 outside a hotel in Kent, Washington, federal prosecutors allege in a federal complaint.
Newcomer appeared before U.S. Magistrate Judge Michelle L. Peterson in Seattle on Thursday afternoon on a charge of traveling with intent to engage in sexual acts with a minor. He was appointed a lawyer and ordered to remain in custody pending trial. His defense lawyer Jesse Cantor didn’t challenge Newcomer’s detention.
Newcomer had been convicted of two counts of third-degree rape of a child in Washington in the sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl between July 24 and July 27 in 2020. He served two years and a half in state prison and then was placed on community supervision with an electronic ankle monitor.
The monitor died on Jan. 19 and his Washington state community corrections supervisors lost connection with it.
Case managers with the Washington Department of Corrections are supposed to install and monitor the electronic hardware and review the device tracking information, reports and notifications each business day and document the review. The electronic monitors are commonly used to help keep tabs on sex offenders, according to the department.
People who are ordered to wear the monitors are “required and instructed up front when the devices are installed, to keep the devices charged,” according to Tobby Hatley, a spokesperson for the corrections department. That involves hooking the ankle monitor to a wall charger typically for two hours every 12 hours, according to Hatley.
Washington community corrections officers are also “alerted to programmatic or potential device violations (i.e. low charge) and are expected to follow up with the supervised individual,” Hatley said by email. It’s unclear if that was done in this case. Once a connection to the electronic monitoring anklet is lost and the person under supervision can’t be located, a warrant is issued for their arrest.
Washington officers went to Newcomer’s home to try to find him, but he wasn’t there and a warrant was issued for his arrest, according to court records.
He is accused of connecting with the 14-year-old girl in Oregon using the profile “halycOn” on Snapchat.
He claimed he was 16 years old and went by “Jack,” according to the federal complaint.
Newcomer is accused of picking up the Woodburn girl from her home just before 4 a.m. on April 10, driving her to a Walmart parking lot and sexually assaulting her in his car. Two days later, the girl sneaked out of her house and Newcomer drove her to a Super 8 hotel in Woodburn and sexually assaulted her, according to the complaint.
Woodburn police and the Marion County District Attorney’s Office assisted the FBI in the investigation.
Two months prior, Newcomer is accused of assaulting two girls in Washington state.
In the first Washington case, Newcomer is accused of picking up a 16-year-old girl from her North Bend home about 1 am. on Feb. 7, giving her methamphetamine, taking her to his Seattle apartment, sexually assaulting her and driving her back home about seven hours later, according to a federal complaint.
She told investigators that the man who went by “halycOn” on Snapchat had added her as a friend, picked her up and took her to his Seattle apartment and told her to claim to his roommate and his roommate’s girlfriend that she really was 18 years old. A review of the girl’s social messages and photos revealed Newcomer had sexually assaulted her, the complaint said.
In the second Washington case, Newcomer is accused of picking up another girl he met on Snapchat sometime overnight Feb. 21 after instructing the 15-year-old that she could disable the security alarm on her bedroom window at the family’s Auburn home and advised her to wait until her parents went to sleep before sneaking out, the complaint said.
He also sent her messages, suggesting he would get her a fake ID to claim she was 18 years old and that would allow her to upload videos of their sex to online pornographic websites and charge viewers to watch, the complaint said.
In the Washington case that led to his rape conviction, Newcomer met the 15-year-old victim on Snapchat, claimed he was 17 years old and picked her up in his car less than 24 hours later .He drove from King County to Clallam County in Washington, picked her up near a bed and breakfast that she was visiting with family and drove her about five minutes away and sexually assaulted her in his car. He also gave her alcohol and marijuana before driving her to his parent’s King County home where he lived, snuck her into the home and sexually assaulted her repeatedly over several days before police found her there on July 27, 2020, according to court records.
Newcomer is originally from Black Diamond, Washington, had sex offender housing in Seattle and Burien but was not living at either location, federal officials said.
Investigators asked that anyone with further information on Newcomer contact the Seattle FBI Field Office at 206-622-0460.
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