Crime & Safety

Bellevue Massage Therapist in Rape Case Told Police of Another Victim

The woman said an unlicensed therapist was attacked by the same man but didn't want to report the attack, according to a police document.

A Bellevue massage therapist who told police she was raped in her workplace said she knows of another therapist who was sexually assaulted by the same suspect about two years ago but didn't report it.

Seattle attorney and law firm partner Danford D. Grant is being held in lieu of $3 million bail in connection with the Bellevue attack, as well as sexual assaults on two other victims in Shoreline and Seattle.

The woman told Bellevue police that the man who attacked her last month also raped another Bellevue massage therapist two years ago. However, the other therapist was unlicensed and she did not want to come forward and risk legal trouble, the woman told police, according to a statement of probable cause from a Bellevue Police detective.

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She said that some therapists, especially from other cultures, are afraid to come forward to report assaults for "assorted reasons."

In the past year, massage therapists in Bellevue have been under the microscope for unlicensed practice, which has resulted in several arrests for fraud and prostitution.

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The Bellevue massage therapist was attacked in her office Aug. 28 in the 15200 block of N.E. 20th St. during a scheduled massage appointment, when the client started to make sexual advances toward her during the appointment, the police document states.

Grant told the woman that he wanted her to leave her husband and marry him, and then said he researched her and knew her husband's name and where they lived, according to the document.

When the woman refused his sexual advances, he grew angry, threatened her with a pocket knife and proceeded to sexually assault her, the document said.

The woman told police she recognized him as being a past client of the business, but she didn't know his name, police said. He had come to the business using multiple names, including "Hunter," "Bob" and "Daniel," according to the document. She later picked him out of a photo montage of suspects, police said.


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