Guilty verdicts for Wasilla man who escaped house arrest to attack former coworker again

PALMER — A Palmer Superior Court jury handed down a verdict of guilty on all counts Monday for the Wasilla man charged in the kidnapping and sexual assault of a former coworker.

In March 2016, Jordan King was awaiting trial on earlier charges — that he assaulted Shawna Robb in December 2015 — when he escaped house arrest and abducted Robb.

The two worked together at a Wasilla restaurant.

Robb, 41, testified during the trial that she suffered a 12-hour ordeal during which she was sexually assaulted twice after being led through the woods on a dog leash with her hands bound. She suffered a deep gash in her leg as well as cuts, bruises and bite marks before she talked King into giving himself up.

Robb's family blames state authorities for the second attack.

She was never told that King, 25, had fled the supervision of his parents, who were serving as his court-appointed third-party custodians. He abducted her at knifepoint around 4:30 in the morning after leaving his parents' home before 8 the night before.

[Wasilla woman's attacker escaped house arrest. Nobody told her – and then he showed up.]

The jury began deliberating Thursday afternoon and arrived at a verdict Friday, but because state courthouses close at noon Friday, the verdict wasn't read until Monday morning.

Jurors found King guilty on more than a dozen criminal counts ranging from attempted murder to vehicle theft.

He'd already entered guilty pleas to a charge of kidnapping and sexual assault. The jury also entered guilty verdicts on those charges.

King's court-appointed defender, Krista Maciolek, said last week in closing arguments that her client didn't want to kill Robb — he asked if she'd visit him in jail — and the evidence didn't support the charge of attempted murder. Prosecutor Brittany Dunlop argued notes King left about murder and causing pain, combined with his treatment of Robb, justified a guilty verdict.

King faces potential sentences of five to 99 years on the attempted murder and kidnapping counts, and 15 to 35 years on sexual assault and attempted sexual assault counts, according to Dunlop.

Sentencing was scheduled for Feb. 16. The judge will decide whether King's sentences will run at the same time or one after the other.

Robb did not attend any of the trial except for the day she took the stand. Her family members, including her mother and twin sister, Heather, attended daily.

Heather Robb said in a message after the verdict that the family is relieved.

"Shawna will never recover what she has lost," Heather Robb wrote, but the family hopes her story will shed light on the victim notification process already in place if someone escapes a third-party custodian.

"Ensuring that this does not happen to another person may provide necessary healing and comfort in knowing this traumatic event did not occur in vain," Robb wrote.

The Anchorage Daily News generally does not publish the names of victims in sexual assault cases. In this case, Robb and family members agreed to be named.