A high-risk sex offender released in Nanaimo despite a warning from B.C. Corrections has been arrested, accused of assaulting a woman.
John Ambrose Seward, 27, appeared in Nanaimo provincial court on Tuesday and was charged with aggravated assault and intent to commit a sexual assault by choking.
A woman told Mounties she was walking along the railway tracks near Caledonia Avenue about 6:30 p.m. Saturday when she was approached from behind, choked and assaulted, said Const. Gary O’Brien, Nanaimo RCMP spokesman.
The woman managed to fend off a man, who fled the area.
She had significant injuries but managed to flag down pedestrians who came to her aid and called an ambulance. B.C. Ambulance paramedics called police.
Based on the description the victim provided to police, Seward was located a short distance away and arrested, O’Brien said. Seward is being held in custody until his court date on July 14.
The woman was taken to Nanaimo Regional General Hospital for treatment and has been released. She is being helped by victim services as well as family and friends, O’Brien said.
To protect her privacy, the victim’s age is not being released .
Seward has lived in Nanaimo since April 2 after being released from federal prison. He had been serving a five-year sentence for a string of violent sexual assaults in Port Alberni between April and September 2009.
B.C. Corrections released a public notification when Seward was released. The notice said he has “maintained a pattern of predatory and opportunistic violent sexual offending” and that women between 15 and 55 were at risk.
Seward was arrested within hours of his release after allegedly breaching conditions by being in a public park. He was released less than a week later.
O’Brien said Nanaimo Mounties had been monitoring Seward closely and he had not been in breach of any more conditions.
“We monitored him as much as we could. The guys on the street were monitoring him every day,” O’Brien said. “We know there are individuals who have a propensity to reoffend.”
Seward was convicted in 2010 of three counts of sexual assault and two counts of sexual assault with a weapon. He stalked his victims and the level of violence increased with each attack.
In one case, he dragged a sex worker into an alleyway and choked her. In another, he forced a woman to perform a sex act at knifepoint as he threatened to kill her. Later that day, he stabbed an 18-year-old woman in the buttocks with a sharp object.
