Man waits 3 days to call cops after prostitute dies in tub

Police say they will likely not seek charges against a Lake City man who waited three days before calling police after a prostitute died in his apartment. The woman, whose age is not known, died of unknown causes, said Seattle police spokeswoman Reneé Witt. Results of an autopsy, including toxicology reports, are pending.

Witt said the incident is not being investigated as a homicide. However, the investigation remains open, and the course of action will be determined once the cause of death is known, she said.

According to a police report, the man told police he picked up the woman at a Seattle bus stop at about 7 p.m. on May 18. They rode the bus back to his apartment, where they smoked marijuana and had sex, according to the report.

The 39-year-old man is not named in the report.

Three hours later, the woman went to take a bath and the man walked to a nearby convenience store to buy beer, police said. When he returned, the woman was still in the bathroom.

After 15 minutes had passed, the man looked in the bathroom and found the woman unresponsive, police said. He shook and slapped her, but she was apparently dead. Police said the man told them he reacted by jumping out a window and digging a hole in the side alley, where he planned to bury the body. But he changed his mind and stopped digging.

"He felt he was doing the wrong thing, so he filled it back in," according to the report.

Conflicted, he poured cold water over the woman's body, so it wouldn't decompose, the report said. For the next three days, according to the report, the man sat in his apartment "drinking and contemplating." On May 21, he walked back to the convenience store and called his boss from a pay phone. His boss, who was not identified, told him to call police, and the man did so the next morning, the report said.

Juliana Piccillo, with the advocacy group Sex Workers Outreach Project, said she was concerned the woman's death may not be thoroughly investigated because she was a prostitute.

"I hope this guy would be charged in the same way as if it was a nurse or a nun, if they find that he was negligent in seeking medical care for this young woman," she said. "It's concerning that he didn't do something sooner, call 911, because she would have family worrying about her, and he was more concerned with his own safety."

Roxana Popescu: 206-464-2112

or rpopescu@seattletimes.com