NORFOLK, Va. — A grand jury in Norfolk has indicted an accused serial rapist on 28 charges.
William Phelps IV was arrested in October of last year, but his alleged crimes date back almost 15 years.
Police arrested Phelps after fingerprints and DNA evidence linked the 33-year-old to several assaults in Norfolk and one in Chesapeake.
It was Phelps trying to buy a gun that led Norfolk police to him.
He was arrested last year and a DNA sample was taken in the aftermath of an attempt to buy a firearm, where police say he was flagged after lying on a consent form.
His fingerprints used to buy the gun were matched with those from a case on Jan. 9, 2008, where two teenage girls were raped behind a garage in Norfolk at gunpoint.
Now, a grand jury has indicted the 33-year-old alleged serial rapist and charged him with forcible sodomy, aggravated sexual battery and abduction with intent to defile, among other charges.
According to the indictment, all of the incidents happened between December 2007 and October 2008 and involved nearly a dozen victims.
Hampton therapist Sharde' O’Rourke said even more than a decade later, watching this process play out won’t be easy for those victims.
"If it was someone who experienced it through time and they were kind of going through their process and healing and such, and this comes out of nowhere for them, it is...and can be a trigger to regress," she said.
Robin Gauthier, the executive director of Samaritan House, said she hopes this arrest can bring peace.
"Victims want to make sure this doesn’t happen to anyone else. They want it acknowledged that it’s happened to them, they want to be believed, they want people to understand that they’ve been hurt and they just don’t want this to happen again," Gauthier said.
O’Rourke said if Phelps is convicted, she hopes there is a sense of justice.
"I don’t know that there is ever closure, but I think there can be completion if that makes sense. Like, this justice process can come to a complete something," O’Rourke said.
Phelps is also accused of one assault in Chesapeake, but all of these charges are in Norfolk.
If you or someone you know is a victim of sexual assault, there is help available.
You can call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-4673 and they can provide resources. There are also specialized counselors available at the YWCA in Norfolk.