A long, painful chapter of Spokane’s history has come to a close with the death of Kevin Coe.
Coe died Wednesday morning in a Federal Way adult care home. He’d been transported there in October after Spokane County Judge Julie McKay agreed with attorneys for Coe and the state that Coe no longer posed a danger to the community.
By that time, he was in failing health. He apparently died of natural causes.
The decision to release Coe was a controversial one, in part because critics say the state didn't do enough to notify the public of its decision.
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Coe was suspected of being the man dubbed the “South Hill Rapist,” responsible for dozens of sexual assaults.
In 1981, a jury convicted him of four rapes. Those were overturned by the state Supreme Court because victims were hypnotized to help them remember details of their attacks.
He was then convicted of three rapes in 1985. Two of those were overturned for the same reason.
Coe served 25 years for the remaining conviction. Then he was remanded to a state facility in McNeil Island because he was considered too dangerous to be released.
Coe’s passing comes just three weeks after the death of the prosecutor who tried his cases, Donald Brockett.
