Whatcom investigators seeking answers after rescuing 16-year-old kidnap and rape victim
Even though a convicted sex offender had warrants for his arrest, the Whatcom County Sheriff’s Office says it was unable to locate or arrest him before it found him with a 16-year-old girl he reportedly kidnapped, held in a shack north of Bellingham for 10 days and raped.
The victim meanwhile is getting help since deputies rescued her Wednesday night, Nov. 18, but questions remain about who dropped her with the man 10 days before she was able to call for help.
Darrin Scott Moseley, 39, was arrested by deputies and booked into Whatcom County Jail Wednesday on suspicion of charges including first-degree kidnapping and first-degree rape.
On Friday, Nov. 20, sheriff’s office spokesperson Deb Slater released more information about the arrest and the victim in an email to The Bellingham Herald.
Though Moseley was a previously convicted sex offender and had multiple warrants for his arrest, sheriff’s deputies were not able to take him into custody until Wednesday night, Slater reported.
“The simple answer is that two of his warrants were misdemeanor warrants that, due to COVID restrictions, he could not be booked into jail on, absent felony-level charges,” Slater wrote. “The failure-to-register warrant from Snohomish County, even though a felony, could not be served as they would not extradite him down to Snohomish County due to COVID.”
Under the conditions of Moseley’s release in Snohomish County, he was supposed to be living there, but Slater said he never reported to Snohomish County authorities to register his address.
The property where Moseley was located Wednesday is owned by a family member, but Moseley was not supposed to be there, Slater reported. Though deputies learned that he was on the property several days earlier and made several attempts to contact him, they could not locate Moseley, according to Slater.
Slater also said that the sheriff’s office is continuing to investigate who dropped the 16-year-old victim off at the property.
“The child does not appear to have a family support system in the area and it does not appear that anyone missed her, or reported her missing in the 10 days she was gone,” Slater wrote.
After she was treated at the hospital, Slater wrote that she was taken into protective custody and placed with Child Protective Services.
A call for help
Deputies were called to an area north of Bellingham at approximately 5 p.m. Wednesday for a welfare check, after a juvenile female called 911, gave her name, said she “just need(ed) to go home” and hung up, according to a sheriff’s office release Thursday. Dispatch could not reach the caller, but the location of the call was traced to the 4700 block of North King Mountain Road.
Deputies contacted Moseley in a 10-foot-by-10-foot shack he lives in on the property, according to the release, and saw a 16-year-old girl inside the shack. She immediately ran outside and asked the deputies to taker her home.
When the victim spoke to deputies in private, she reportedly told them that Moseley had kept her there against her will after she had been dropped off 10 days earlier.
Deputies arrested Moseley on the outstanding warrants and took him and the victim to the sheriff’s office for further interviews, according to the release.
It was during those interviews that the victim reported that Moseley had sexually assaulted her and, at one point, held a knife to her throat, the release states. Moseley also reportedly deleted the contacts off her phone, gave her alcohol and marijuana and threatened to kill her if she tried to leave.
Moseley admitted to having sex with the victim and to giving her alcohol and marijuana, the release states.
Whatcom County Superior Court records show Moseley’s warrant out of Snohomish County was from 2018. Court records show he was convicted of failing to register as a sex offender in 2001, 2006 and 2014 in Whatcom County and 2001 in Kitsap County.
Moseley also has previous convictions for robbery, bail jumping and making a death threat by phone, court records show.
Court also records show, as a juvenile, Moseley was convicted of first-degree rape of a child for a 1997 incident and of first-degree child molestation for a 1994 incident, both of which occurred in Whatcom County.
