KENNEWICK — A Kennewick man is accused of taking extraordinary steps to stalk two women more than 200 miles away. And investigators believe there may be many more victims.
Investigators say that Justin William Hughes spent more than 1½ years harassing two women, who were friends, in Vancouver. He impersonated family members and hijacked social media accounts all in an attempt to get a hold of them.
He allegedly carried out this campaign from the Pasco home he was living in at the time, according to court documents.
When police investigated his Google account, they found 50 folders allegedly showing they weren’t the only ones suffering from his pattern of harassment.
Franklin County prosecutors have charged the 29-year-old man with stalking, two counts of first-degree computer trespassing and two counts of first-degree criminal impersonation.
He is currently being held in the Franklin County jail in lieu of $150,000 bail, and if he’s released he’s not allowed to use a computer.
He pleaded not guilty to the charges and a trial was scheduled for Aug. 9.
While police say that he carried out a pattern of stalking and harassment on several women, he has not been charged for those cases.
It’s unclear how Hughes became fixated on the women. But this is not the first time he has been in trouble for stalking.
He was sentenced to stalking and three counts of harassment in Cowlitz County in 2017. He was sentenced to a year in prison.
Harassment and stalking
The investigation into the pattern of harassment started in November 2022 when a then 26-year-old woman went to Vancouver police to complain.
She brought a thumb drive that had 148 screenshots showing how Hughes allegedly contacted her, her friend and her family.
His first messages came about two years before when he pretended to be a friend asking to borrow her shoes. He then sent a photo of the woman and one of her friends in swimwear. He then sent her a cropped photo of her feet wearing the shoes she wore on prom night.
She told investigators that she didn’t know if she knew the person sending the messages. But she had received several text, Snapchat, Facebook and Instagram messages.
He called her at least twice a week and at inconvenient hours, such as midnight, 2 a.m. or 5 a.m. And sent a text message weekly or every other week.
Two days before going to police, Hughes allegedly reached out to the woman’s father and pretended to be her mother. He claimed he was locked out of her email account, and said a code had just been texted to his cellphone.
When her father provided the code to Hughes, he allegedly used it to hijack his Yahoo email account, and social media accounts. He allegedly used that account to try and contact the woman.
A new email was discovered connected to the Yahoo account and Facebook account.
“The ongoing harassment has made her frustrated and ‘definitely afraid,’” according to the court documents. “Since she is unsure whether she knows the suspect or not in real life, it has made her somewhat paranoid.”
She no longer meets with clients by herself and started carrying a self-defense spike on her keychain.
His second victim
He allegedly started harassing his second victim about six months after the first. The two women were friends, and they both noticed the same pattern of messages asking about her shoes and her feet.
He would often call from strange numbers and at inconvenient hours, including getting five calls in a row at 4 a.m.
“Since the ongoing harassment, she has felt paranoid. Her anxiety escalated when she started getting messages from the suspect via her family’s accounts,” according to the affidavit of probable case. “(She) is concerned the suspect has a great deal of her information.”
She became more careful about walking to her car, started carrying mace and felt the need to let friends and family know where she is when out.
Hughes allegedly used a familiar method to get a hold of the second victim’s mother. He pretended to be the woman’s son to get a hold of her email and then her Instagram page.
He allegedly connected the same email addresses to the account that he used for the other victim’s father’s account.
Police were able to link those email addresses to an IP address that was at Hughes’ home. Also one of the email addresses was linked to a Gmail address “justinhughes343123.”
Investigators also found 50 folders that were organized and labeled in the Google Drive allegedly showing he was stalking and harassing a large number of women, according to court documents.
Detectives had tracked him to a Powder Drive home in Pasco. He was living there until sometime in April when he moved to Kennewick. Police arrested him on June 8.
