A Superior man is facing charges after allegedly threatening to sexually assault and kill a woman.
Gerald Wayde Looker, 808 Broadway St., who turned 43 today, appeared in Douglas County Circuit Court on Wednesday for a preliminary hearing on charges of first degree sexual assault, false imprisonment and threats to injure. He's also facing a misdemeanor battery charge.
According to the criminal complaint:
Police received a call about a woman running naked in the streets near North Third Street and Tower Avenue shortly after 4 a.m. Aug. 20. When officer Paul Winterscheidt arrived, a T-shirt-clad woman waved him down. She was upset and had several bruises on her face, arms and legs. She told Winterscheidt she was attacked in a tent a couple hundred yards north of a neighborhood bar.
After searching for the suspect, Winterscheidt transported the woman to the hospital for a sexual assault examination and treatment of her wounds. Afterward, she went to the Law Enforcement Center to provide a statement.
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The alleged victim told police that she had left a fast food restaurant around 10:30 p.m. on Aug. 19. She and Looker, who have a 14-month-old child together, headed to a Tower Avenue bar where they bought a half-pint of vodka before they rode their bicycles back to the tent. She said when they returned there, she was tired and wanted to go to sleep.
She said Looker drank the entire bottle of vodka in one shot and stayed outside the tend for about 15 minutes. Then he came into the tent, laid down next to her and started touching her. In spite of pushing his hands away and telling him to stop, she said he continued to touch her so she tried to leave the tent, "but he threatened to kill her and throw her in the bay if she left." He then threatened her with a knife and stabbed it into the tent floor around her.
The victim said she was scared and the next several hours were "horrid." She said Looker forced her to undress and he struck her in the face, torso, legs and arms when she tried to leave.
At one point, she told police, he promised to let her go to sleep if she had sex with him, and she agreed "out of desperation and fear," according to the criminal complaint. Instead of sex, he violated her with a glow stick, the complaint states.
Officer John Heinen arrested Looker a short time later near North Fifth Street and Hammond Avenue.
Arraignment on the charges is slated for Sept. 18.
Shelley Nelson covers Superior/Douglas County. Call (715) 394-4421, ext. 134 or e-mail snelson@superiortelegram.com .
