A Port Angeles man could face up to life in prison for the alleged rape and assault of two Sequim teens in June 2024 near the Dungeness River Railroad Bridge Park.
Daniel L. Sigmon. 25, made his first appearance in Clallam County Superior Court on Wednesday, Sept. 10 with his arraignment scheduled for Monday, Sept. 15. Judge Simon Barnhart set Sigmon’s bail at $125,000 with Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Steve Johnson requesting $250,000 due to the offenses.
Sigmon is being held in Clallam County jail on four pending counts of rape of a child in the second degree, a count of child molestation in the second degree, and a count of assault in the second degree. For the four counts of rape, he could face up to life in prison and/or a $50,000 fine for each count, and up to 10 years in prison and/or a $20,000 fine for each of the other charges.
Johnson said that there is a concern for public safety if Sigmon were released because the teens were strangers to him before the alleged offenses that occurred in a public place.
Court appointed attorney Harry Gasnick said Sigmon has no criminal record prior to his arrest, but Barnhart said that “for now, with the nature of the allegations, the bail is appropriate based on the information the court has.”
Barnhart signed off on a no contact order for Sigmon with the two teens, and any female under 16.
Sigmon was arrested early evening on Tuesday, Sept. 9 at a bus stop on U.S. Highway 101 by Sieberts Creek, three hours after his warrant for arrest was issued, according to the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office.
Probable cause statement
Court documents state that deputies initially responded around 10:47 p.m. on June 19, 2024 to Railroad Bridge Park for a reported missing 13-year-old female. The girl’s father told law enforcement she left around 8 p.m. that night with her friend, also a 13-year-old girl, and hadn’t returned.
They were not found upon initial search, but were later found by Sequim police officers in the park with Sigmon at around 12:24 a.m. the next morning.
The girls told law enforcement they were with the man who said he was 19, his name was Danny, his dog was named Kevin, and they were hiding from a bear.
The man, later identified as Sigmon on body cameras, was free to leave as no allegations were made at the scene. However, he could not be found later in the day, the sheriff’s office reports.
About an hour after the girls were released to a parent, a sibling of one of the girls reached out to a deputy telling him that one girl was sexually assaulted and that both were inappropriately touched, according to court documents.
One girl was given a SANE (Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner) exam, and the other a strangulation exam on June 20, 2024 at Olympic Medical Center. Both teens participated separately in child forensic interviews through Healthy Families of Clallam County on June 25 and 26.
Court documents state that the girls said Sigmon approached them while they were swimming in the river and offered to make them a fire.
Court documents state that he took one teen away from the fire and sexually assaulted her, and the teen told the interviewer that she didn’t want to be killed and felt paralyzed.
After the assault, Sigmon and the teens started to walk to the parking lot, saw police and went back on the path, court documents state.
When the first teen went back to check to see if the police were still in the parking lot, she said Sigmon followed her and allegedly molested her.
The teens said they soon thereafter thought they saw a bear, and continued to hide with Sigmon.
The second teen told the interviewer that while hiding Sigmon pulled her back any time she tried to move, and that he he grabbed her throat, and that he reached into her pants and touched her genitalia.
She said, via court documents, that Sigmon pressured them to stay longer, they didn’t know him, didn’t want to get hurt, and their cell phone batteries were dead.
Through access to her phone, deputies found communications and a photo from Sigmon through Snapchat that they later connected to him. They also found a photo on Facebook via search warrant of him wearing a black sweatshirt similar to the one found on police officers’ body-worn cameras.
Through a warrant, detectives also confirmed in July 2024 Sigmon’s GPS location, which showed that he was in the park the same time as the two teens.
Deputies report that Sequim Police Department were investigating another sexual assault incident on June 18 where a 16-year-old girl was supposed to go to Sequim Walmart to engage in consensual sex for methamphetamines with a man associated with a motorhome parked there.
She told an officer that he had a dog named Kevin, that he was rough with her in a previous sexual encounter and that he put his hands around her throat.
Sequim Police Department officials said they completed their investigation last year, are no longer investigating the matter, and shared their information with the Sheriff’s Office.
Clallam County Sheriff’s Office detectives later traced the motorhome to Sigmon, which was sold to a man unaffiliated with the incidents.
In January, Sigmon was found sleeping on McComb Road and told law enforcement he had been out of state.
Chief Criminal Deputy Amy Bundy said in an interview that Sigmon had been hard to find and that they didn’t know where he lived.
In April he was found living in a Port Angeles apartment, and on July 22 detectives received a search warrant to seize his DNA for evidence, which they obtained from him voluntarily the next day.
Sigmon’s DNA was sent to the Washington State Patrol Crime Laboratory on July 23 and results were received on Sept. 5.
Court documents state that the results from the SANE and strangulation exams provide “very strong support” for Sigmon being the male contributor to the DNA found in the samples.
Bundy said the investigation was lengthy due to Sigmon’s unknown whereabouts at times, search warrants being issued, cell phone analysis, law enforcement database inquiries, and the DNA analysis.
