Child Molester Wins Appeal, Disappears

A serial child molester who confessed to a therapist that he had attacked more than 200 victims is a free man after successfully appealing a life sentence, leaving investigators and his family worried he will strike again.

Without fanfare or conditions of probation, Edward Harvey Stokes walked out of Orange County Men’s Jail last week.

His conviction was overturned by the 4th District Court of Appeal, which ruled that Stokes’ constitutional right to cross-examine his accuser was compromised because the alleged victim -- a 16-year-old boy -- had committed suicide by the time a supplemental 83-page police report came to light.

As authorities in California, Oregon and Washington try to figure out where Stokes is to ensure he registers as a sex offender, prosecutors and his own sister said they were disappointed in the justice system and were unsettled that he was free.

“It is appalling to me that a person with his criminal history has been released,” Susan Stokes wrote in an e-mail to Los Angeles Times reporters. “He is dangerous.”

John D. Barnett, one of several attorneys who represented Stokes, said the court was fair in upholding the fundamental right that any defendant has to confront an accuser. Barnett said his client left California, but “that’s all I know.”

The appellate court’s decision, which the state Supreme Court refused to review, is the latest twist in a story that dates back three decades, when, police say, Stokes began victimizing teenage boys in the Pacific Northwest.

Stokes, who was first arrested in 1974, targeted runaways or troublemakers, hoping they would be too afraid to go to police. Records indicate he has been arrested at least five times on sex offenses and has served jail and prison time.

According to police, Stokes often gave his victims alcohol and drugs, making it more difficult for them to fend off his sexual advances. Some said they awoke in handcuffs or leg shackles.

In a letter to a therapist in the early 1990s, Stokes estimated he had molested 212 victims and felt like a monster because of it. “I am angry at myself and others,” he wrote, “but I still seek out the weak and the unsuspecting as my victims.”

The victim in the Orange County case was Blue Karak, a teenage runaway whom Stokes allegedly met at a Seattle coffeehouse in 1996. Days earlier, Stokes had been arrested for parole violation and released on $25,000 bail.

Stokes lured Karak to California by promising he would pay his expenses, according to court testimony. The two checked into the Little Boy Blue Motel in Anaheim, where, Karak said, he was forced to drink tequila and take LSD until he submitted to Stokes’ sexual advances. Karak told police that even though Stokes took him to Disneyland, the attacks continued until he ran from the motel and reported the incident to police. Stokes was arrested a few weeks later in Reno on weapons charges.

Before trial, the court agreed to a conditional examination of Karak, agreeing the boy was often difficult to locate and had indicated that he planned to leave the state. Defense attorneys were allowed to cross-examine Karak during this proceeding, but repeatedly opposed the idea, arguing that Stokes should have the right to confront his accusers at trial.

Nearly a year after the conditional examination, prosecutors disclosed the existence of a supplemental report by a detective from the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department that contained information inconsistent with Karak’s testimony.

The defense never had the chance to question Karak about those inconsistencies, because he committed suicide several months before the trial. Still, the trial judge allowed the testimony to be entered as evidence against Stokes. He was ultimately sentenced under California’s “one-strike” sexual assault law, which allows for a life term in aggravated cases.

But Barnett said the police report was a vital document and that its belated disclosure, whether unintentional or deliberate, was a clear miscarriage of justice.

The appeals court reversed the sentence in November.

“Aside from the victim’s testimony, little evidence existed to support the charges against defendant,” the court wrote.

Matt Murphy, a deputy district attorney who helped prosecute Stokes, said he was “profoundly disappointed in his release.

“Edward Stokes is a sexual predator,” Murphy said. “We worked extremely hard to make sure he would spend the rest of his life in prison.”

The life sentence against Stokes had brought closure to previous victims and police in Washington and Oregon who had grown frustrated that Stokes always seemed to escape harsh punishments.

“There’s no doubt in my mind he’s going to commit another crime. The question is when and to what extent,” said Det. Casey Johnson of King County, Wash. “He could be absolutely anywhere.”