Man Held in O.C. Serial Rapes : Crime: Pool hall owner suspected of 86 offenses including sexual assaults, burglaries, over 8 years.

A Temecula pool hall owner is a suspected serial rapist who may have committed 86 burglaries, sexual assaults and other crimes across Orange County during an eight-year rampage that ended with his arrest, authorities said Tuesday.

Police said the 45-year-old suspect typically left his victims obscene notes or exposed himself during burglaries and sometimes returned to the same homes to rape the women who lived there.

The victims range from a 12-year-old girl to women in their late 40s, investigators said. The attacks occurred in Santa Ana, Orange, Anaheim, Fullerton, Garden Grove, Tustin and Placentia and date back to the summer of 1987, police said.

“Those are just the cases we know about,” Santa Ana Lt. Robert Helton said. “There could be more. Many of these types of cases go unreported.”

Police identified the suspect as Kenneth George Wade, a former truck driver now living in Temecula, who has an arrest record dating back more than 25 years.

Wade was arrested July 25, and since then Santa Ana police detectives have worked with investigators across the county to link him to a series of unsolved assaults and burglaries, including 32 cases in Orange, 24 in Santa Ana and 11 in Anaheim.

For several years, Helton said, a Santa Ana detective had been trying to make a connection between the unsolved cases in the city and those elsewhere in the county. Helton said Tuesday he did not know whether the department had issued public warnings about the unsolved cases over the years.

“Clearly, he’s been very elusive,” Helton said. “It took us a while even to develop a relationship between the burglaries and the sex crimes, then to the Santa Ana incidents and those in the other cities.”

Investigators said the case came together after Wade’s arrest in an Anaheim neighborhood where he allegedly tried to rape one woman and exposed himself to another there. That same day, Orange police were investigating a similar report that a man had exposed himself to a woman.

The Anaheim reports jarred the memory of Anaheim Sgt. Jim Moore, who recalled a string of unsolved rape cases in which a burglary suspect who exposed himself to women would return to rape them, Helton said.

That prompted Moore to dispatch other officers to the Anaheim neighborhood, near Park Vista Street and Jackson Avenue, where the attempted rape and indecent exposure were reported. There, police spotted a man in a white Honda Accord who matched the description provided by victims, Helton said.

After a short car chase followed by a foot chase at a nearby apartment complex, Wade was arrested by Anaheim police on suspicion of possessing stolen property, resisting arrest, evading a police officer and indecent exposure.

He was later booked on suspicion of rape, attempted rape, residential burglary and indecent exposure in cases involving 24 victims in Santa Ana. Wade was being held Tuesday without bail at Orange County Jail. His arraignment is set for Aug. 11.

Wade’s attorney, Deputy Public Defender Donald Barkemeyer, could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Investigators are setting up police lineups in an attempt to connect Wade to the 62 other cases in Orange County. Police said they are reviewing physical evidence found at the crime scenes.

“You’re talking about a very brazen individual,” Helton said. “What’s so unique about him was there wasn’t any real pattern of the attacks. It was at all times, all hours of the day, every day of the week.”

Anaheim Lt. Ted Labahn said authorities may be unable to prosecute Wade on some of the sex offenses because of expiration of a six-year time limit imposed by statute.

Wade served two prison sentences in the period from December, 1990, to February, 1993, for first-degree robbery and grand theft. During those years, Helton said, the series of rapes following burglaries stopped.

Since the late ‘60s, Wade had struggled with drug and unemployment problems before embarking on the burglary and theft string that landed him in state prison twice, according to a county probation report.

He was arrested about a dozen times dating back to 1969 on charges of drug possession and sales, weapons possession, sexual assault and indecent exposure, some of which were dismissed for insufficient evidence, according to court records.

The new charges stem from a series of crimes that began in July, 1987, when Santa Ana police started investigating home invasions where a burglar entered through a window or a back door left open and “took his time” going through jewelry boxes and purses for cash and jewelry, Helton said. There was no evidence that the intruder used force to enter the homes.

On several occasions, the burglar stole his victims’ cars to commit other crimes, police said.

“He would leave them obscene notes mentioning how easy it was to get into the residence and how he could have raped them,” Helton said. “Or he would use profanity and vulgarity to describe what he would do to them sexually.”

When the victims were home, the man would expose himself before fleeing with the stolen property, police said. But whenever the intruder ran into a man he would run away, investigators said.

Sometimes the intruder would learn a woman’s name or other data, possibly from a driver’s license or other identification found during the burglary, then recount these personal facts upon returning to rape her.

When he returned days or months later, the man would remind the women that they hadn’t heeded his warnings, Helton said. His rape victims were usually in their 20s to 40s, police said. He burglarized a home while a 12-year-old girl was home and exposed himself to her before fleeing, according to investigators.

“He was very bold,” Helton said. “He never tried to hide his face.” Sex crime investigators worked on cases for several years without any solid leads to a suspect. But Santa Ana Detective Linda Faust and other investigators began compiling a portrait of the rapist and details that link the victims to each other, Helton said.

Orange Lt. Timm Browne said his department’s investigation of 32 cases is continuing and declined to comment on specifics, saying only that the cases are consistent with those in Santa Ana.

“We’re trying to work the most recent cases because the victims are more likely to remember him,” Helton said. “Then we’ll work backward from there.”

Times staff writers Anna Cekola, Tracy Weber and Davan Maharaj and correspondent Shelby Grad contributed to this report.