Suspect Identified in Woman’s Fatal Beating Near Bar : Crime: Recently paroled rapist vows to police that he won’t go back to prison. Authorities ask for help finding man they describe as ‘an extreme danger to society.’

Authorities were searching Saturday for a recently paroled felon who is suspected of beating a 23-year-old Huntington Beach woman to death after meeting her in a bar early Friday.

Police asked for the public’s help in finding Edward Patrick Morgan, 28, of Orange, who has a history of violence and rape and was described as an “extreme danger to society.”

On Saturday, Morgan talked with police and vowed that he would not be taken back to state prison, authorities said.

“This is not a guy who should be out on parole,” Orange Police Lt. Timm Browne said. “Our department is very concerned with why he was out on parole in the first place. His history is pretty frightening.”

Morgan is wanted in connection with the slaying of Lenora Annette Wong in a parking lot across the street from the Australian Beach Club Restaurant and Nightclub, where the two had met, Browne said.

Police said he had no car and was believed to be traveling on foot somewhere in Southern California.

“He can run, but he can’t hide,” Browne said.

He described Morgan as 5-foot-8 and 200 pounds. The parolee also has several tattoos, including a lightning bolt, Asian language characters, a mermaid and the name “Eddie.”

Police investigators said they spoke to Morgan early Saturday morning, when he phoned his own apartment--possibly from a friend’s residence. Despite pleas from police that Morgan turn himself in within an hour of the call, a friend of Morgan’s relayed the suspect’s response: He had no interest in surrendering.

Early Friday, Wong’s body was found in a parking lot across the street from the club a few hours after she was reported missing. She died of injuries to the neck, head and pelvis, Browne said.

One piece of valuable evidence may turn out to be a videotape from a surveillance camera outside a pharmaceutical company across the street from the nightclub, police said. Investigators had not reviewed the tape.

Orange police got an anonymous tip Friday night that pointed to Morgan as a suspect in the killing, Browne said, adding that the same night, Morgan called several other women he met at the bar to set up dates.

Police sent a SWAT team to Morgan’s Orange apartment at 1:20 a.m. Saturday, Browne said. Neither Morgan nor his roommate were home, so officers staked out the apartment.

Detectives entered the apartment again at 8 a.m., this time armed with a search warrant, and Morgan called there two hours later, Browne said. Police answered, telling Morgan they wanted him to meet them to discuss his parole status.

Soon after, the telephone rang again. This time, it was a friend of Morgan’s, who was calling to ask questions about why police wanted to see Morgan. Investigators told him they wanted Morgan to turn himself in by 11 a.m.

Shortly before the deadline, the friend called police again to say Morgan would not return. At that point, Browne said, “we told him we wanted him for murder.”

Investigators said Morgan--who was released from prison in March--was a frequent visitor to bars in Huntington Beach and was seen with a group of white supremacist “skinheads” near the Huntington Beach Pier within the past two weeks.

“We have every reason to believe he’ll be out on the bar scene again,” Browne said.

State Department of Corrections records indicate that Morgan was sent to the California Institute of Men at Chino in January, 1985, after he was convicted of a felony, and was paroled in September, 1986, to New York. Authorities said the conviction was for rape.

He was sent to Chino again in April, 1991, transferred to Avenal State Prison in Kings County, and released on parole the following September, according to a Corrections Department official. The offense: unlawful sex with a minor.

Morgan was sent to Folsom State Prison for another offense in March, 1993, the corrections official said, and was released on parole late last March. The details of the third conviction were not available Saturday.

As police identified a suspect in the case, Wong’s father tried not to think about Morgan, but focused on his only daughter.

Wong graduated from UC Riverside in business in 1993, and was recruited out of college to be an assistant manager at a Foot Locker shoe store in Westminster, said her father, Ben Wong.

“She only had two months to go until she would become manager,” Ben Wong said.

Store employees at Wong’s workplace said they were too stunned to talk. “A lot of us are at a grieving point right now,” the store’s manager said.

An avid tennis player, Wong had a lot of friends from work but was “on the shy side,” her father said through tears. She liked to dance at clubs with friends but usually could be counted on to be the designated driver because she didn’t drink alcohol, he said.

A memorial service for Wong will be held Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. at Preston and Simons Mortuary, 3358 7th St., in Riverside. Her father asked that in lieu of flowers, people make donations to their favorite charity in Wong’s name.

Authorities request that anyone with information about Morgan call the Orange Police Department at (714) 744-7444.

The bar where Wong disappeared is offering a $5,000 reward for information about the case.