By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
CHEHALIS – A judge this afternoon ordered a 24-year-old Winlock man held on $500,000 bail following his arrest for a sexual assault of an 8-year-old girl in a Mossyrock-area campground almost five years ago.
Reginald L. Juntunen was identified only late last month as a suspect through DNA, according to the Lewis County Prosecutor’s Office.
He was in Lewis County Superior Court yesterday on an unrelated matter when he was taken into custody.
Temporary defense attorney Bob Schroeter told the judge Juntunen is a graduate of Winlock High School and a life-long resident of the South Lewis County town.
Charging documents in the case allege the child was anally raped by a dark-skinned male wearing a hoodie and a stocking cap who forced her into the public restroom.
The girl, who is now 12, said she rode her bicycle to the nearby bathroom when she saw the man.
She said he told her he had a knife and to stop screaming, and he left in a yellowish car, according to the documents.
Deputies at the time collected a tissue the girl had wiped herself off with when she returned to the family’s motor home, the documents state.
On July 2, the sheriff’s office received a report from the Washington State Patrol Crime Laboratory declaring a match with Juntunen.
Lewis County Deputy Prosecutor Joely O’Rourke said his DNA would have been entered into the system from a previous felony.
Juntunen told detectives yesterday he’d been to the park camping with his family when he was nine years old and two years ago fishing with a friend, but not in 2007 when he was 19 years old.
“When asked by Detective Callas if he could explain how his DNA was recovered from semen found on a female child, Juntunen’s eyes got very large, he appeared to be in shock, and he simply said ‘no’,” charging documents state.
O’Rourke said she has not yet spoken with the victim, and doesn’t know where she is from.
Juntunen is charged with first-degree rape, first-degree rape of a child and first-degree kidnapping with sexual motivation. Each offense carries a maximum penalty of life in prison.
The Winlock man is currently in Lewis County Drug Court, having entered in connection with a case in which he allegedly sold jewelry to a Centralia boutique that had been stolen in a February burglary in Winlock.
Yesterday he was in court to plead not guilty to burglary and theft related to a case in which he and another individual allegedly were involved in a May break-in at another Winlock residence and a stolen banjo and guitar were sold to a pawn shop.
He has a 2008 drug conviction.
Juntunen is represented by Chehalis attorney Chris Baum.
He will return to court next Thursday morning to make his plea in this new case.