A hearing is scheduled for Feb. 27 in King County Juvenile Court to determine whether a 15-year-old Kent boy charged with two East Hill rapes will be tried as an adult.
The boy, who attended Kentwood High School in Covington, had a status conference Wednesday in Juvenile Court, according to the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office.
Prosecutors will request that the boy be tried as an adult. Prosecutors charged the boy Nov. 10 with two counts of first-degree rape and two counts of first-degree kidnapping in connection with attacks on a 17-year-old girl and a 19-year-old woman on separate nights in late October.
If convicted in Juvenile Court, the boy would be incarcerated up to his 21st birthday, according to prosecutors. The minimum sentence in adult court is 28 to 36 years in prison with a potential maximum sentence of up to life in prison.
The boy is scheduled to have another status conference Jan. 27.
Because the boy is 15, the Juvenile Court will first handle the charges. A Juvenile Court judge must order adult prosecution for the boy and decline the case, which would send it to King County Superior Court.
Under Washington state law, an offender who commits a serious violent offense is automatically charged in adult court if they are 16 or 17 years old. The boy turns 16 in March.
In each incident, the boy approached the woman and the girl after they had exited a bus, according to charging papers. In each attack, the defendant allegedly told the victims he had a gun and threatened to shoot them if they did not cooperate and go with him to a secluded spot. He reportedly raped both women while continuing to threaten them with what he said was a gun.
The girl and woman provided a similar description of the boy. Kent Police released sketches of the suspect. The drawings generated a number of tips.
Kent Police arrested the boy Nov. 7 at Kentwood.
Detectives matched DNA collected from the boy with DNA evidence collected from the woman and the girl, according to charging papers.
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