A Washington man is accused of raping a 16-year-old girl after luring her outside using a picture of a gun with her house in the background and a warning that he’d murder her grandparents if she didn’t “go with him.”
Alec Leonardo Lepe is being held on a $1 million bond after the Oregon girl was saved from his home.
Online jail records confirm Lepe, 25, has been charged with sexual exploitation of a minor and harboring a minor.
Police spoke to the victim, who told them she received a text message on February 25 from an unfamiliar number with the threatening image attached. In the message, the teen was told she “needed to go with him or he would kill her grandparents,” according to court documents obtained by Us Weekly.
The teen, who lives with her grandparents, ran away from home and was met by a man wearing a ski mask, who drove off with her in a lifted four-door truck.
The girl told police Lepe made her drink something “spicy” that made her pass out. She later woke up in the man’s home, where she was held for several days. She told cops when he left for work every morning, he took her phone with him and warned her to stay put, as he’d had cameras set up all around the property. When he returned from his job, he raped the girl, she alleged.
Meanwhile, authorities in both states worked together to track the missing teen, and learned she was at Lepe’s home. On Saturday, February 28, deputies were pulling up to the home when they saw Lepe behind the wheel of a Dodge 3500.
He denied knowing anything about the missing girl and kept driving away, police said. At around the same time, the teen managed to find a phone and called 911.
Deputies started walking towards the home and could hear the girl crying out for help.
She was taken to an area hospital for treatment. Police searched the home with the owner’s permission but found no guns or ski masks. The owner did tell police he knew Lepe owned both a rifle and a shotgun.
On Sunday, March 1, Lepe asked a friend to call investigators to say he would be turning himself in. However, Lepe has denied knowing the girl was at the house or denied traveling to her home.
It was unclear Thursday, March 5, if Lepe had retained legal counsel or had appeared before a judge to enter pleas to the charges he faces.
Anyone with information related to this case is urged to contact Detective Randy Loyd at [email protected].
If you know of a young person who is being exploited or is the victim of a crime, you are urged to report it to your local FBI field office by calling 1-800-CALL-FBI. Tips can also be left at tips.fbi.gov
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