Convicted Sex Offender Charged in Violent Stanley Park Washroom Assault

A 35-year-old man with a prior conviction for sexual assault is facing new charges after a violent attack on a woman in a public washroom at Stanley Park.

Vancouver police say Ronald Hartley Duckhorn was arrested Monday after a woman in her 40s was found injured and robbed in a women's change room near the Second Beach pool. A witness reported seeing a suspicious man enter the facility around 11 a.m., prompting the call to police.

Duckhorn is now facing four serious charges: sexual assault with a weapon, assault by choking, robbery, and unlawful confinement. The victim received hospital treatment following the incident.

This is not Duckhorn’s first encounter with the justice system. In 2022, he pleaded guilty to a similar attack on a woman in Surrey two years earlier. That assault occurred near the King George SkyTrain Station, where the woman was threatened with a weapon, robbed, and pulled into nearby bushes before being sexually assaulted.

Duckhorn received a global sentence of five and a half years for the Surrey incident, including credit for time already served. He was also added to the national sex offender registry and ordered to provide a DNA sample.

In addition to his prior sexual assault conviction, online court records show Duckhorn has previous criminal convictions for robbery and break and enter.

The current charges have not yet been proven in court. Duckhorn remains in custody and is scheduled to appear in Vancouver provincial court on May 23 for a bail hearing.