Man charged in Lincoln Park jogger attack out on bail, says he's innocent

Duane Starkenburg defies you not to slip on the way down to the waterfront trail near Lincoln Park.

To get there, "you need to walk all the way down the bluff, and there's some stairs made out of dirt and wood" that get slippery after it rains, Starkenburg said after bailing out of King County Jail on Thursday night. He was home after being charged with misdemeanor assault.

Starkenburg, 46, says he was "outraged" when he was arrested Tuesday and maintains he did not assault the woman jogging in front of him on the stairs, though the woman says he grabbed her by the hips purposefully.

"I don't remember running into her," Starkenburg said. "I went down and my hands went into the mud. I was covered in it."

He also denied that the incident was in any way related to other recent attacks on female joggers in Seattle.

"It's not like I'm this guy who puts on makeup and is running around attacking women," he said.

Investigators, though, allege the West Seattle man is linked to additional assaults on two other women in Lincoln Park last year.

On Friday, King County prosecutors charged Starkenburg with two counts of indecent liberties for allegedly attacking a woman in August and another in December. He is also charged with one count of attempted indecent liberties in connection with Tuesday's attack on a woman jogger. Starkenburg is scheduled for arraignment on Feb. 10.

At a hearing Thursday, King County District Court Judge Eileen Kato found probable cause to order Starkenburg held on two counts of indecent liberties and one count of attempted indecent liberties. He was released after posting $150,000 bail.

Christopher Swaby, an attorney with the Defender Association, had asked that bail be set at $25,000, telling the judge that the crimes Starkenburg is accused of committing were "really inept attempts to meet people." Swaby, pointing out that Starkenburg hadn't dragged anyone into the woods or attempted to remove the women's clothing, argued he was not a danger to the community.

But Kato said she was concerned for the public's safety. "The allegations here are very serious ones," the judge told Starkenburg. Kato ordered Starkenburg to stay out of Lincoln Park.

Starkenburg previously pleaded not guilty to the misdemeanor assault charge filed in connection with Tuesday's incident, but is now facing a felony attempted indecent-liberties charge in that case.

In the two earlier incidents, the attacker came up from behind two victims, pretended to trip, grabbed the women's hips and then buried his face between their buttocks, according to the Seattle police report filed Thursday. Both women were able to fight the man off and flee, the statement says.

Just before 4 p.m. Tuesday, a 27-year-old woman was jogging on the waterfront trail in Lincoln Park, in the 8000 block of Fauntleroy Way Southwest. According to police, a man ran up behind her and attempted to tackle her, throwing his arms around her legs. The woman, who was not injured, was able to break free and get away.

Starkenburg was arrested as he attempted to cross Fauntleroy Way Southwest, according to police.

Following Starkenburg's arrest, the two other victims identified him as the man who attacked them from a photo montage, according to the police report.

On Dec. 8, a woman identified by the initials TC told police she was walking up some stairs to the parking lot in Lincoln Park when a man asked for her help, saying he had injured his shin. She let him hold onto her shoulder and helped him up, the report says. As they reached a landing, "the suspect got behind TC and that's when he grabbed her by the hips," it says. The woman screamed as he pushed his face into her buttocks, according to the report.

The suspect attempted to grab the woman's ankles but she kicked him and got loose, the report says. She turned and saw him lying on the ground: "He told her, 'Oh my God, I can't believe I did that. I'm sorry,' " according to the report. The man claimed it was an accident.

The woman helped create a sketch of the suspect, the report says.

In August, a woman identified by the initials LH said she passed a man but then heard steps close behind her as she jogged down a hill, according to the report. As she turned a corner, the man grabbed her hips and planted his face in her buttocks: "For a split second, she tried to rationalize that he could have tripped but she realized, 'no, that was deliberate,' " the report says.

She also told police the man said it was an accident, according to the police report.

In 2006, Starkenburg was sentenced to three months of work release after pleading guilty to second-degree assault, according to court records.

He repeatedly struck a woman's car with his own in December 2005, drove off but then returned, screaming at the woman who had pulled over to call 911, the records say. He reached into her car, grabbed her cellphone and took off, but the woman followed his vehicle and was able to give police his license-plate number, court records say.

Sara Jean Green: 206-515-5654 or sgreen@seattletimes.com

Information from Seattle Times archives is included in this report.