PORT ANGELES — Calling the woman he attacked in 2005 a liar, Steve E. Ong showed no remorse after he was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Clallam County Superior Court Judge George L. Wood sentenced the 41-year-old Sequim man for the sexually-motivated second-degree assault of the woman, now 27.
Ong, who was convicted April 9, was sentenced under the state’s 1993 three-strikes law for offenders who have committed three felonies from the law’s “most serious” list of felonies.
Ong’s other two strikes — both of which occurred in Clallam County — were for second-degree assault in a rape-related case in 1992 and second-degree kidnaping that involved a girl younger than 10 in 1995.
Port Angeles lawyer Loren Oakley of the county Public Defenders Office, representing Ong, said after the sentencing that the case will be appealed to the state Court of Appeals.
The April trial was the second for the same case. Ong was sentenced in 2008 for the same assault.
The state Court of Appeals overturned the conviction, ruling the jury was prejudiced by learning Ong had prior convictions for burglary and car theft.
The woman Ong attacked testified she was sitting at Railroad Bridge Park in Sequim on May 28, 2005, with her 21-month-old son when Ong walked up, crouched down, asked for a cigarette, put his hand on her knee and tried lifting her skirt.
When she resisted, he tackled her, she said. When she continued to fight back, he lifted her son off the ground by his neck, then fled.
Ong was arrested seven hours later.
One witness who saw the woman after the attack said her clothes were disheveled. He and another male witness said she had red marks on her neck.
‘Looking over shoulder’
“Not only do I worry about the sun going down, I am constantly looking over my shoulder,” the woman told Wood before he sentenced Ong.
“I was able to fight back. . . . It didn’t happen to a little girl who wouldn’t have had a chance.
“Not once, but twice, I was able to sit in a room full of strangers and relive this nightmare that I have tried to forget. . . . And now this monster will never be able to hurt again.”
Ong testified he put his hand on her knee and never tackled her, and that he fled after she screamed profanities.
On Wednesday, Ong, never turning to face the woman, also made a statement to the court before two sheriff’s deputies led him away in chain-restraints.
“Well, [the victim] lied,” Ong said. “Other than that, I said everything at trial.”
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@ peninsuladailynews.com.
