3 Attacks in Mission Viejo Prompt Warnings

City leaders are warning women to be on the lookout for a rapist who is believed responsible for three attacks in this quiet South County community during the last two months.

Mayor Sharon Cody said the City Council was urging residents to exercise precautions as investigators try to catch the man responsible for the rape of three women in the Wilderness Glen park area.

The latest attack occurred Thursday shortly after dusk when a 21-year-old jogger was pulled off a sidewalk into some bushes and raped. Two weeks ago, near the same area, a 16-year-old girl was grabbed from behind and raped.

And in May, a 31-year-old woman was jogging on Los Alisos Boulevard north of Entidad when she was attacked from behind by someone who pulled her down a slope onto a field at Del Lago Elementary School. Her attacker ran off when she broke away from him and began screaming.

The violence has rocked this planned community, which has one of the lowest crime rates in Orange County.

Police were advising residents, especially women, not to jog alone at night and to choose well-lit and busy areas when they go walking and jogging in the evening.

Noting that many Mission Viejo residents had moved here to escape urban crime, Cody said city officials “definitely want to go out and get this problem fixed.”

She urged residents to be alert.

“Sometimes, we feel we live in an area where crime couldn’t happen, but there’s no place like that,” Cody said. “We have to make it very difficult for sick individuals to prey on people.”

Officials with the Sheriff’s Department, which serves the city, described the attacker as 22 to 25 years old, about 5 feet, 10 inches tall, with shoulder-length brown hair. He wore blue jeans and white tennis shoes in the latest attack.

Deputies have begun intensifying their patrols of the area along Los Alisos Boulevard between Entidad and Cordova Road, Cody said.

Sheriff’s officials asked anyone who may know the identity of the attacker or who may have seen someone in the area matching the suspect’s description to call investigators at (714) 647-7000.