Prosecutors have announced new charges against a man who abducted and sexually assaulted a woman in Northern California, which was initially thought to be a hoax, and has now been identified as. kidnapping “Gone Girl”..
Matthew Muller, 47, the man who abducted Denise Huskins in Vallejo in 2015, is being charged in two counts of her assault from 15 years ago.
Muller broke into women's homes in Palo Alto and Mountain View in 2009, with the intent of raping them, according to the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office.
Thanks to new leads and advances in forensic DNA testing, the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office, along with Palo Alto and Mountain View Police, were able to identify Muller in those cases.
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Matthew Muller, a Harvard-educated immigration attorney, was eventually arrested for Huskins' kidnapping after he was caught in a similar home invasion on his forgotten cell phone. (Solane County Sheriff's Department)
Muller's DNA was found on the bones he used to tie up one of the victims in another 2009 case, the DA's office said.
Muller now faces two felony counts of sexual assault during his 2009 crime spree. If found guilty, he faces life in prison, officials said.
“The details of this man's violent crime seem straight out of Hollywood, but they are unfortunately true,” said District Attorney Jeff Rosen. “Our goal is to make sure this defendant is held accountable and never hurts or threatens anyone again. Our hope is that this nightmare is over.”
In the early morning hours of September 29, 2009, authorities said Muller broke into a woman's Mountain View home, assaulted her, tied her up, drugged her, and said he would beat him. After the victim, who authorities say is in his 30s, pushed him against it, he suggested the victim get the dog, then ran away.
Less than a month later, on Oct. 18, authorities said Muller entered a Palo Alto home, where he performed the same procedure and bound and gagged a woman in her 30s. He then gave her Nyquil and began beating her, before she was forced to stop. Muller gave the victims crime prevention advice, then fled.
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Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn appear at a news conference with attorney Doug Rappaport (left) in San Francisco, Calif. Thursday, Sept. 29, 2016. Huskins and Quinn were victims in a mysterious kidnapping case in Vallejo in March 2015. Matthew Muller is charged with kidnapping Huskins. (Paul Chinn/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
Both cases were investigated at the time and were not resolved.
Muller gained national attention six years later as the subject of “American Nightmare,” a Netflix documentary series chronicling the 2015 “Gone Girl Hoax” kidnapping of Denise Huskins from Vallejo and the 48-hour disturbing in captivity.
On March 23, 2015, Muller broke into Vallejo's home, where he was taking drugs, and bound Huskins and her boyfriend. He kidnapped Huskins, brought her to a house in South Lake Tahoe, and sexually assaulted her. Two days later, Muller drove his victim to Southern California and released him.
Vallejo police initially believed the attack and abduction was a hoax orchestrated by her boyfriend, Aaron Quinn, a ploy that the media considered the real “Gone Girl,” says Ben Affleck's hit song and novel “Gone Girl,” in which a small-town woman goes on a killing spree to get revenge on her cheating husband.
The Vallejo Police Department headquarters is seen in Vallejo, Calif. on Tuesday, July 14, 2015. (Paul Chinn/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
Although they said at a press conference that they were treating the case as a kidnapping, KRON4 reported, the Vallejo Police Department suspected Quinn of killing his girlfriend and to create his account. He endured 18 hours of questioning, according to the docuseries.
The couple sued the Vallejo Police Department for $2.5 million, but not before enduring months of public scrutiny.
Huskins and Quinn told the filmmakers that Misty Carausu, the rookie detective who solved the case, was their hero. On June 5, 2015, a couple woke up in the middle of the night to what sounded like a home invasion.
After reaching out to police departments in the Bay Area, NBC Bay Area reported, Carausu learned that Muller was a suspect in a 2009 home invasion in Palo Alto. Also at the scene were glasses black bathing suits with yellow hair tape attached.
While the woman hid in the bathroom and called the police, her husband was able to fight off the attacker. But he left important evidence behind: zip-ties, duct tape, gloves and a cell phone.
Carausu traced the phone to the man's stepfather, Matthew Muller, a Harvard-educated immigration attorney and Marine veteran.
At that time, Carausu contact the FBIand Muller was arrested for his attack in Dublin, California, on June 8.
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Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn are pictured at a press conference. Both hired lawyers after being publicly accused of domestic assault, and fear losing their medical jobs. (MIKE JORY/THE TIMES-HERALD via AP)
Evidence in his home, including Quinn's laptop, eventually linked him to Huskins' kidnapping. Muller's confession matched Quinn and Huskins' stories perfectly, right down to the tapes, removable sunglasses and water coolers.
Muller pleaded guilty to one count of federal theft in September 2016 and was sentenced to 40 years in prison. Muller also faced federal charges for robbery, burglary, and kidnapping two counts of aggravated assault.
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The Vallejo Police Department publicly accused Denise and Aaron of faking their problem, receiving a series of bad news before their assailant was arrested for trespassing at the same home. (Associated Press)
But he was considered unfit to do so stand the charge for those fees in November 2020, according to the documentary. Muller is said to have contracted “Gulf War disease” after his death military service, and his lawyer said he had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, NBC News reported.
In 2022, Muller was sentenced to 31 years in state prison in 2022 after pleading no contest to two counts of the forced rape of Huskins.
He is currently being held at a federal prison in Tucson, Arizona.
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Huskins and Quinn previously told People magazine that they did not know why Muller targeted them.
Like many victims, or many people who have it you have gone through a disasteryou don't have all the answers,” Quinn told the magazine. “And that can be a sure point of recovery. So, for us, we don't rely on finding those answers, but what we have to do is to continue in the unknown and focus on the things that are most important to us, like our families, our children, our work. They are durable. And having answers to why they're watching us doesn't change what we do going forward. “
The couple married in 2018, released a book about their ordeal in 2021 and welcomed daughters in 2020 and 2022.
Christina Coulter of Fox News Digital and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Stepheny Price is a reporter for Fox News Digital and Fox Business. Story tips and ideas can be sent to stepheny.price@fox.com