A Colorado sex offender suspected of repeatedly stabbing his 12-year-old daughter and leaving her for dead in the Idaho wilderness is on the run from the law.
The girl was in critical condition under police guard late Thursday in a Spokane, Wash., hospital.
John Rollins Tuggle, 37, of Hayden traveled to northern Idaho to visit his daughter, whom he had not seen in 10 years because he had been locked up in an Idaho prison, said Sheriff Chuck Reynalds of Shoshone County, Idaho.
On Wednesday, Tuggle told his daughter he was taking her to a mall, but Reynalds said he instead took her to a remote area in the wilderness called the Lost Creek drainage.
She was stabbed all over her body and was near death.
A family that pulled into a nearby campsite heard the girl yelling for help about 1 p.m. She was about 40 yards off in the brush, and it was only by chance that anyone even found her, Reynalds said.
“She could not walk. She was weak,” Reynalds said.
The girl had to be carried to the family’s camper, and they drove her to an eatery, where they called for help.
Tuggle was convicted in the statutory rape of a 14-year-old female relative on March 27, 1995. The victim and her family, who live in Idaho, declined to comment Thursday.
Tuggle was sentenced to 1 1/2 to nine years in state prison, and corrections officials decided to hold him for the entire nine-year term, said Teresa Jones, spokeswoman for the Idaho Department of Correction.
Jones said information about what kind of treatment Tuggle got while in prison was not available.
“At that time frame, we did not have a lot of sex-offender treatment,” Jones said.
Tuggle left the Idaho prison on Jan. 20, 2004.
His daughter was taken to a hospital in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and later flown to Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane.
“She is awake, and our detectives want to interview her this afternoon,” Reynalds said Thursday.
Tuggle is considered armed and dangerous, and he is a registered sex offender in Colorado and Idaho, Reynalds said.
He could be driving a red Ford Escort with Colorado license plate 329 JXG, authorities said. Anyone who spots him should call police immediately, Reynalds said.
Routt County Sheriff John Warner said officers in his northern Colorado county have been looking for Tuggle since the stabbing.
“We are obviously searching all county roads, state highways and monitoring residents,” Warner said.
It’s not clear if the girl had been allowed to go with her father.
“We have not talked to the mother,” Reynalds said. “She is a basket case and has been with her daughter in the hospital room.”
Reynalds said he didn’t know whether the girl was sexually assaulted during the incident.
“We have not interviewed her yet, and we do not know. We have no idea. Basically what we have done is put her in skilled professional hands,” he said.
Staff writer Felisa Cardona can be reached at 303-820-1219 or fcardona@denverpost.com.
