(Stillwater, Okla.) — A Stillwater man who is a convicted rapist, burglar and stalker was arrested Wednesday afternoon by a Stillwater Police Department Special Operations Team on an outstanding warrant accusing him of violating a zone of safety by entering Boomer Lake Park in Stillwater on May 10 after being designated as an aggravated sex offender by the Oklahoma Department of Corrections.
An additional charge of asking, inviting or enticing a 3-year-old child in Stillwater to go with him to a secret place on May 17 was filed today against Eric Thomas Hurd, 44, who was ordered held in the Payne County Jail on $200,000 bail. No other details were immediately available in that case.
His mother, Ethel Mae Hurd, 72, who was charged with harboring a fugitive for allegedly allowing her son to reside in her residence with the intent to assist him to avoid arrest, was ordered held in the Payne County Jail on $10,000 bail today.
Due to his extensive criminal record, Eric Hurd could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted.
Stillwater Police Captain Kyle Gibbs said in a news release that Eric Hurd is a lifetime registered aggravated sex offender. “He registered with the Stillwater Police Department in June 2014,” at his mother’s residence at 820 E. Lynn Lane, the news release said.
“In April of 2015, Stillwater police learned that 820 E. Lynn Lane was within a protected buffer zone of a day care that was not previously known to the police department,” the news release said.
Eric Hurd was sent a letter advising him he had to move to a new address, but as of Wednesday he had failed to comply with the mandatory sex offender registration requirements, the news release said.
According to court records, in February his mother sought and received a protective order against him, but after he was arrested for violating the protective order, his mother asked that it be dismissed.
“During the early morning hours of May 17, a patrol officer contacted Eric Hurd in the 600 block of Tower Park,” where he was driving a blue 2003 Toyota pickup that was impounded for a traffic violation; Eric Hurd was released since no arrest warrant had been issued at that time, the news release said.
“The patrol officer did note in his impound report that a gun holster was located in the vehicle,” the news release said.
“Based on Hurd’s extensive criminal history, evidence that he may be armed with a firearm, the domestic complaints by his mother and concern for her safety, the Special Operations Team was utilized to take Hurd into custody,” which was accomplished without incident Wednesday afternoon, the news release said.
Hurd was convicted in 2003 of first-degree rape and first-degree burglary in Oklahoma County in 1999 for which he was originally given a five-year prison term followed by five years of probation, which was revoked in 2006, DOC records show. He apparently served a total of about two and one-half years in prison, from which he was released in 2007, DOC records show. Hurd was also convicted in 2003 of stalking and first-degree burglary in Payne County in 1996 and given a five-year prison term of which he served one and one-half years, DOC records show.
Hurd was also convicted in 2003 of extortion of money in Texas County in 2001 and given an 18-month prison term of which he served about seven months, DOC records show.
In seeking an arrest warrant for Hurd, Stillwater Police Officer Christopher Hummel wrote in an affidavit “After my contact with Eric at Boomer Lake Park, I looked into Eric’s criminal history. I found that Eric is a convicted aggravated sex offender and is labeled as a level 3 offender, according to the official State of Oklahoma Sex Offender Registry.
“Level 3 is described as a ‘designation that the person poses a serious danger to the community and will continue to engage in criminal sexual conduct,’” the affidavit said.
Stillwater police were sent to the park about 10:24 p.m. on Sunday, May 10, after a woman reported being followed by a dark-colored Toyota pickup truck, the affidavit said.
“Because we have been getting dispatched to a lot of suspicious vehicle calls with the same vehicle description as this particular call, I went to Boomer Lake Park to provide assistance to the responding officers,” Hummel wrote in his affidavit.
When Hummel arrived, he noticed that two Stillwater police officers had a pickup stopped in the middle of the road that runs alongside Boomer Lake, near a playground, he wrote in his affidavit.
Hummel said that he immediately recognized the driver as Hurd since he had been dispatched to numerous calls involving Hurd in the past, the affidavit said.
“He was driving an older model blue Toyota Tundra pickup truck that matched the description that dispatch had put out as the suspicious vehicle.
“In my past experiences with Eric, I have found that he is often times erratic and very unpredictable.
“I started out by asking him general questions, such as asking him if he still lived with his mother in the Tower Park addition of Stillwater,” which Hurd said he did, Hummel wrote in his affidavit.
“Eric told me numerous times that he was just hanging out at the park, specifically sitting in the parking lot,” Hummel wrote in his affidavit.
“Once Eric was checked for warrants, he was released,” and left the park in his pickup truck, the affidavit said.
A week later, the officer contacted the woman who reported the incident at the park, the affidavit said.
She said that she and her boyfriend “were hanging out at the boat loading dock, located in the southwest area of Boomer Lake Park,” when they saw a dark-colored Toyota Tundra pickup truck with headlights on and running in the parking lot area, but the vehicle did not move, the affidavit said.
She said “she began to have a ‘bad feeling’ about the pickup,” so she and her boyfriend left the boat loading dock and started walking north along the paved walking trail with their dog, the affidavit said.
“They said that as they began walking north, the pickup truck from the boat loading dock followed,” very slowly almost as if it was just idling along, the affidavit said.
She said that eventually, the truck, still running with headlights on, pulled into a parking area, but never parked, the affidavit said.
“She told me that as soon as she and (her boyfriend) walked past the pickup truck, it would pull out of that parking lot and slowly idle by them before pulling into the next parking lot.
“At some point, the pickup truck could not pull off into a parking lot and began staying in the middle of the road…The pickup truck began pulling over to the east side of the road and made numerous attempts to contact (her) from inside the pickup,” the affidavit said.
“She told me that the male made comments about how he was playing a game and how he was watching them or could see them. (She) told me that the male was acting very strangely and his sentences were not making any sense,” so she called for her dog, the officer wrote in his affidavit.
“She told me that she had her cell phone in her hand and wanted to call the police department, but did not feel safe enough at the time to make a phone call,” the officer wrote in his affidavit.
She said that the man in the pickup truck continued to follow her and her boyfriend while they walked north on the paved walking trail — then they walked across a foot bridge that he could not cross in the truck, the affidavit said.
She said “after she called the police department, officers quickly arrived on scene,” the affidavit said. She said that the officers had contacted the correct vehicle, the affidavit said.
Her boyfriend said “the pickup truck had been following them for approximately 30 minutes,” the affidavit alleged.
“He stated that he and (his girlfriend) had walked approximately half of a mile and were contacted or attempted to be contacted approximately 12 times by the male in the pickup truck,” the affidavit alleged.
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