A man who says he is a suspect in the disappearance of a 19-year-old Aurora woman has been charged with attempted murder in the assault of a woman who leapt from a burning Fort Collins apartment last week.
Travis Forbes, 31, was in the Larimer County jail when he was formally arrested Monday night in connection with the assault and arson that forced Lydia Tillman to jump from her second-story window at around 5:30 a.m. on July 5.
Tillman, 30, was injured during the fire and by the leap from the window. Doctors confirmed she had been physically assaulted before her apartment was set on fire. She remains hospitalized, Fort Collins police spokeswoman Rita Davis said.
Forbes was charged Tuesday with arson, sexual assault, first-degree assault with a deadly weapon and aggravated motor-vehicle theft, according to court records. Bail was set at $350,000.
The arrest affidavit in the Tillman case has been sealed.
Forbes became a person of interest in Tillman’s assault after officials learned late last week that he was in the Fort Collins area, Davis said.
Police then began watching him. He was arrested early Sunday morning for false reporting of identity to authorities.
The Denver Post does not typically name victims of sex assault; however, Tillman’s family last week identified her in an appeal for help in finding her attacker.
Forbes has previously said he is a suspect in the disappearance of Kenia Monge, 19, who vanished April 1 from Denver’s Lower Downtown nightclub district.
Denver police spokesman Sonny Jackson said neither Forbes nor anyone else is a suspect in Monge’s disappearance. Forbes’ arrest has not changed that, Jackson said.
In interviews with The Denver Post, Forbes said he was only trying to help Monge when he offered her a ride home early on April 1 as she left her friends and personal belongings behind in a LoDo club. He said he let her out at a gas station and that she walked off with a stranger. She has not been seen since.
Police have searched Forbes’ business and van and a farm in Larimer County. They found holes in his story and have outlined odd circumstances in search-warrant affidavits.
In early May, Forbes was arrested in Austin, Texas, on a felony aggravated-car-theft warrant out of Wheat Ridge.
Documents obtained Tuesday shed new light on that case.
The theft charge was brought only after a Denver detective asked Siva Sunoon of Wheat Ridge whether she was going to file a theft report after Forbes failed to return her 1990 Toyota 4Runner.
Sunoon, Forbes’ former girlfriend, could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
According to the Jefferson County arrest affidavit, Forbes stayed at Sunoon’s house less than a week after Monge went missing. He borrowed her SUV to deliver granola bars he sold. He was to return it April 19 but, instead, moved to Texas.
She called Denver police April 29 and told a detective about Forbes not returning her vehicle. She considered filing a missing-person report because she believed Forbes was distraught about suspicions related to Monge’s disappearance and may have killed himself.
The detective encouraged her to file a stolen-vehicle report. Only two hours after she filed a report in Wheat Ridge, she got a call from Austin police saying her SUV was recovered.
Eleven officers from multiple Texas law enforcement agencies followed Forbes, who drove the SUV to an apartment. Forbes had taken a bicycle from the SUV and was riding away when a Travis County sheriff’s deputy turned on his emergency lights, signaling Forbes to stop. He didn’t. Another officer, who was on foot, knocked him off the bike and arrested him.
Because of the quick recovery of her SUV, Sunoon told police she suspected Denver police knew where the vehicle was all along.
Days after his arrest, Forbes called Sunoon and apologized for not telling her what his plans were.
She claimed she felt coerced to file the theft report and asked that the charges be dismissed, court documents say. The Jefferson County district attorney’s office later dropped the car-theft charge.
Staff writers Liz Navratil and Jordan Steffen contributed to this report.
