Man charged with sexually assaulting 2 women he met via Backpage.com

A man is charged with sexually assaulting two women at knifepoint last year at a South Side apartment building.

Jesse Lee, 24, is facing two counts of aggravated criminal sexual assault with a weapon in attacks that occurred about a month apart at a seemingly vacant apartment in the West Englewood neighborhood, Cook County prosecutors said.

Lee contacted both women through the advertising website Backpage.com and arranged to meet them in the 6300 block of South Hoyne, prosecutors said.

A 26-year-old woman met Lee on Oct. 19, 2017 outside the apartment, where he was waiting for her to arrive, prosecutors said. He led her to the apartment, which she told investigators appeared empty except for a mattress.

Lee then took out a pocket knife and threatened the woman while taking her iPhone and then sexually assaulting her, prosecutors said. When she tried to escape, she found the door was padlocked and chained. He choked her, cut her arms with the knife and threatened to shoot her.

When she was allowed to leave, she called a friend, sought treatment at a hospital and reported the attack to police.

The second incident happened about a month later.

A 21-year-old woman met Lee outside the apartment on Nov. 18 and he led her to the rear of the building, prosecutors said. He then shocked her with a stun gun and choked her. While holding her at knifepoint, he stole her money and cellphone and sexually assaulted her. She also sought treatment after the attack and reported it to police.

Sometime after the second attack, the 26-year-old woman purchased a new phone and saw that Lee had been using the phone he stole from her. She found photos of Lee uploaded to her iCloud account, authorities said. When he was taken into custody Saturday at his home in the Rogers Park neighborhood he was still in possession of the cellphone.

Lee was previously convicted of a 2011 armed robbery, sentenced to six years in prison and paroled in August 2016, prosecutors said.

He was denied bail and scheduled to return to court Feb. 28.