Rapes May Be Linked

Police are trying to determine whether a man who attacked two older women Saturday in a Los Alamitos mobile home park is the elusive “Belmont Shore rapist,” who has struck at least six times in neighboring Long Beach.

The attacker entered the home of his first victim shortly before 1:20 a.m. and raped a 71-year-old woman who had been alone and asleep with her front door unlocked in the Royal Oak Mobile Home Park, police said.

An hour later, a man believed to be the same assailant assaulted a 68-year-old woman who lives just a short walk from where detectives were investigating the first attack. Again, the man entered through an unlocked door and attacked the woman but in this case did not rape her, police said. She suffered minor physical injuries and was treated at a hospital.

The attacker fled after stealing the second victim’s car, a beige 1987 Honda Accord, license plate 2DWF746. As of Saturday evening, police had not found the vehicle.

The assaults bear striking similarities to half a dozen rapes that alarmed residents in and around the upscale Belmont Shore area of Long Beach from 1997 to 1999.

In the Long Beach rapes, older women were targeted late at night as they slept alone with doors or windows unlocked. Detectives linked the six rapes to a seventh attack in Huntington Beach about the same time. Victims described the attacker as a slender white man, 5-foot-9 to 5-foot-11 and 25 to 35 years old.

Last month, after a nearly three-year hiatus, a similar string of attacks began. Since April 6, three more women, ages 54 to 74, have been sexually assaulted in their Long Beach homes late at night.

Long Beach police said Saturday that they will probably examine the Los Alamitos attacks.

“That sounds like the same M.O.,” said Long Beach police spokeswoman Nancy Tabing, “but whether or not they are related remains to be seen.”