Running late, she got a ride from a stranger. The rape suspect was arrested in Wichita

A 17-year-old girl in Oklahoma City was running late to work, so when a young man who she did not know offered her a ride, she accepted it.

The girl told investigators with the Canadian County Sheriff’s Office that she was walking to her place of work – a fast-food restaurant in Bricktown – when the man picked her up in a late-model silver Subaru or Nissan Sedan at about 3 p.m. on Dec. 18, 2017, according to a Jan. 11 statement from the sheriff’s office. She said the car had black interior and a Bob Moore tag on the front.

The driver did not turn toward Bricktown, an entertainment district in Oklahoma City, so she told investigators in an interview that she had asked the driver to turn the right way.

That’s when the driver – also a rape suspect – said he wanted to have sex with her and that he would kill her if she tried to get away, the statement said. She said the man had a large knife.

As he was driving, he would periodically pull off into secluded areas and attempt to rape the girl.

“The victim told investigators that she continued to fight him off and resist each of his sexual assault attempts,” the statement said. “She also told investigators that he continued to try to pull her clothes off and groping her, eventually forcing his hands inside of the victim's undergarments, where he raped her by instrumentation.”

The girl was held against her will for about three hours when she was eventually able to escape from the car, run and hide in a wooded area.

“She stated that she hid there for about an hour and half, and watched her assailant as he drove around the area searching for her,” the statement said. “After she felt her assailant had left the area, she was able to make her way to a house where she contacted the residents who in turn contacted the Sheriff's Office.”

The man who opened the door of the house at about 8:23 p.m. said the girl was hysterical as she told him she had been abducted and raped.

The girl describes the man as Chinese with brown eyes and black hair that is shaved on the sides with a mohawk on top. She told investigators he is about 5 feet 6 inches tall, between 140 and 150 pounds and has many pimples on his face, chest and back.

She also said he was left-handed and had a large tattoo of a brown owl with gold eyes on the inside of his left arm, from elbow to wrist.

The man allegedly told the girl that he was 21 years old and had moved from Wichita to Oklahoma City the week before the rape occurred. He said he now lived in the Yukon area of Oklahoma City, according to the statement.

Suspect in custody

By 10 p.m. on Jan. 11 — the same day the Canadian County Sheriff’s Office posted the statement to Facebook — the suspect was not only identified, but in custody, according to a Jan. 16 statement from the sheriff’s office.

The office received a telephone tip from an anonymous source in Wichita. That source provided information that resulted in Wichita Police detectives locating and detaining the suspect.

The Canadian County investigators obtained an arrest warrant in order for Wichita police to hold the suspect.

“If we hadn’t received the news coverage and social media exposure that we did, we may not have caught up to him; as the suspect had a plane ticket out of the country, to Vietnam when Wichita PD picked him up,” Chris West, Canadian County Sheriff, said in a release.

On Jan. 12, Canadian County investigators traveled to Wichita to interview the suspect, who has since been identified as Hoang Vinh Huy Tran, 20, of Wichita, Kansas, and a citizen of the Republic of Vietnam.

In Wichita, Canadian County and Wichita investigators interviewed Tran and processed the 2017 Toyota Camry used during the crime.

“ ...Canadian County Investigators were able to collect sufficient information and physical evidence to establish Tran as the suspect in the Dec 18th kidnapping and rape in Canadian County,” the statement said.

Tran waived extradition to Oklahoma and is currently being held at the Sedgwick County Jail. He is awaiting transfer to Canadian County, where charges will be presented to the district attorney.

Booking reports show that Tran is charged on suspicion of being a fugitive from justice.

This story was originally published January 16, 2018 at 2:25 PM with the headline "Running late, she got a ride from a stranger. The rape suspect was arrested in Wichita."