Tip, trash helped catch suspected Fairfax County sexual predator, court documents reveal

RESTON, Va. - A search warrant revealed new details of how detectives connected helped crack a case involving a series of rapes that terrified people in Fairfax County back in the 1990s.

Jude Lovchik, a suspect believed to be a sexual predator dubbed by police as the Centreville Rapist, was suspected of sexually assaulting four roommates in a Reston apartment on June 6, 1995.

Authorities said Lovchik was wearing a mask and gloves when he climbed onto the balcony of an apartment building armed with a handgun. Lovchik tied the roommates up, blind folded them and then sexually assaulted all of them before fleeing the scene, according to officials.

The crime remained unsolved until March 2017 when a confidential informant came forward to point a finger at Lovchik, according to court documents. For about a month between April and May 2017, Fairfax County police put a house on Linden Tree Lane in Springfield under surveillance.

Detectives were looking for evidence that would link the resident, Lovchik, to a series of crimes connected to the Centreville Rapist.

A search warrant filed in the last two weeks shows that police, while searching Lovchik's trash, were able to find several items with potential DNA.

Nearly four months later, detectives were told a match had been made between DNA recovered from the trash and DNA recovered from the Reston crime scene back in 1995.

Investigators began a deep dive on Lovchik's background after the confidential informant told police that eight years earlier Lovchik confided in the informant that he was responsible for several unsolved rapes in Fairfax County.

Detectives said the informant had information that had not been disclosed to the public. In filing the warrant for a thumb drive, police said they were looking for a video of the assault in June 1995 after one of the victims told police she was able to look under her blind fold and see the masked man filming the assault of one of her roommates.

Lovchik moved to Florida where authorities ultimately took him into custody back in October and he has been housed at the Fairfax County jail. Officials said he has only been charged in connection with the Reston rape case, but stated that their investigation into the other crimes remains ongoing.