Transit Police have arrested Mukesh Yasarapu, a 27-year-old from Vancouver suspected of two different sexual assaults on buses leaving from the Phibbs Bus Exchange in North Vancouver this month.
The first incident happened on April 5 at 7:45 a.m. on a bus heading to Vancouver. With the bus less than a quarter full, Yasarapu got on, sat next to a woman, and repeatedly touched her inappropriately for ten minutes.
According to Transit Police spokesperson Anne Drennan, the woman “rebuffed his advances, but he was persistent until he got off the bus at Main and Hastings.”
A week later, on April 12, Yasarapu allegedly boarded another bus heading to Vancouver from the same exchange. Again, he sat down beside a woman on a near-empty bus and repeatedly touched her inappropriately, before leaving at Hastings and Pender.
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In both cases Transit Police were notified by the victims, and the actions of the suspect were a match.
On April 19, Transit Police arrested Yasarapu at the bus exchange. He’s charged with two counts of sexual assault, and has been released with several conditions, including not to sit or stand next to a female while on public transit.