A Vancouver man convicted of fleeing the country to avoid charges of child rape was back in court Monday on allegations of failing to register as a sex offender.
Ian Andrew Heller, 26, appeared in Clark County Superior Court on that allegation and on suspicion of a domestic violence court order violation. He was previously convicted of one count of third-degree child rape and bail jumping.
Heller raped a teenage girl, whom he knew, when she was 14 years old and then fled to Cambodia to avoid prosecution. The abuse happened between the summer of 2011 and April 2012. Heller was apprehended by local police in the Preah Sihanouk province for having an “illegal expired passport,” according to The Cambodia Daily. Clark County sheriff’s deputies picked him up Sept. 30, 2014, when he arrived in Los Angeles.
He pleaded guilty in exchange for the dismissal of several child rape charges and was sentenced in August to nearly two years in prison.
After Heller was released from prison, he had contact March 7 with his former girlfriend, who had a no-contact order against him, according to court records.
The two had kept in contact despite the order, she said, but she tried to cut off contact with him after he grabbed her steering wheel while she gave him a ride to Portland, frightening her. He began texting her after that, so she reported the violations, according to a probable cause affidavit. Heller contacted the woman’s boyfriend and sent him taunting text messages, the affidavit said.
He also missed a meeting with his parole officer. When police checked his Vancouver residence, they found he was no longer living there, court records said.
Starting from about March 14, Heller failed to register as a sex offender because he didn’t report that he had moved, court documents said. Officers said they later learned he had only lived at his listed home for about a week. He was apprehended earlier this month in South Carolina by members of the U.S. Marshals Service, according to court documents.
On Monday, Judge Gregory Gonzales, who presided over Heller’s case, set his bail at $90,000. He will be arraigned July 1.
