Sign at the Northwestern Joint Regional Correctional Facility, the jail at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington. (U.S. Army) (U.S. Army)
A soldier already imprisoned at Joint Base Lewis-McChord for multiple child sex assaults now faces a murder charge for the death of a civilian taxi driver when he was on the run to avoid his court-martial, Army officials said.
Pvt. Jonathan Kang Lee, 25, has been charged with murder for killing Nicholas F. Hokema, 34, on Jan. 15 during the 12 days that month when he disappeared from the Washington base, said Michelle McCaskill, a spokeswoman for the Army Office of Special Trial Counsel. Lee drove off Lewis-McChord on Jan. 12, two days before his trial on six counts of child sexual assault was to begin.
Lee was found guilty of all the charges in absentia on Jan. 19 and sentenced to 64 years imprisonment. He was captured Jan. 26 and has remained jailed at the base, officials said.
Now Lee faces a mandatory minimum penalty of life imprisonment with the possibility of parole if convicted of murder in Hokema’s death. The premediated murder charge carries a maximum penalty of death, according to military law.
The Army issued a “WANTED” poster for Jonathan Kang Lee after he deserted from Joint Base Lewis-McChord on Jan. 14, 2024. (U.S. Army Criminal Investigative Division)
The Army will next convene an Article 32 hearing to examine evidence in Lee’s new case. An Article 32 is similar to a grand jury hearing in civilian court where it is determined whether there is enough evidence to return an indictment. Instead of a panel of jurors, one officer is presented with evidence and makes a recommendation on how the case should proceed.
A date for that hearing had not been scheduled as of Tuesday, according to the Army’s trial docket.
The Army also charged Lee with six other crimes related to his January disappearance. The new charges include his desertion from Lewis-McChord, robbery, resisting arrest, wrongful use of a controlled substance and two counts of failure to obey a lawful order, McCaskill said.
Lee was living in barracks on Lewis-McChord in January awaiting his court-martial and ordered to report for duty daily to monitor his whereabouts instead of being held in pre-trial confinement. Instead, he drove off the post in an SUV.
Lee, who is from Great Falls, Va., had been assigned to Lewis-McChord since 2019. He had been removed from his position in an intelligence-gathering unit in April 2022 when sex assault allegations against him were first raised.
A local prosecutor that year charged Lee with child sex crimes before ceding the case to the Army because some of the crimes might have occurred in Georgia, officials said at that time.
After Lee’s disappearance, police in Tukwila, Wash., about 30 miles north of Lewis-McChord, linked the soldier to the stabbing death of Hokema, who is from Olympia, Wash. Hokema was found on the morning of Jan. 15, unconscious and bleeding from multiple stab wounds, according to local police. He was transported to a medical facility where he was pronounced dead.
Lee was captured Jan. 26 in Redmond, Wash., about 20 miles north of Tukwila, after police found Hokema’s cab nearby, according to law enforcement officials.
