‘It’s been a long time coming’: Sexual assault victim gets justice 15 years later

By Audrey Weil

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    PORTLAND, Oregon (KPTV) — Fifteen years later, a man who committed sexual assault will now serve time for it.

He was linked to the crime through a sexual assault kit that had been stuck in Oregon’s backlog.

Now the survivor said she’s finally set free.

At just 15 years old in 2007, Audryanna Waldron was walking near the Lloyd Center when she was sexually assaulted.

She said the case wasn’t handled as it should have been at the time. She completed a sexual assault forensic evidence kit but then it sat among thousands of others in Oregon’s backlog.

“I lived for 11 years and learned how to pretty much let it go,” Waldron said.

Then in 2015, several law enforcement agencies came together to get those kits tested, and through a two-million-dollar grant, they tested nearly 3,000 sexual assault kits from across the state.

In 2018, Waldron got a phone call; they’d matched DNA from her kit to a man named Ricky Harrison.

“Considering I was 15 years old when it happened at that point ya know I was an adult, 11 years later, have 3 kids of my own and stuff like that,” she said. “It was quite the shock but it was also a relief at the same time.”

She said it’s been incredibly difficult reliving what happened and going through the criminal justice process all this time later, but now Harrison’s been sentenced to nearly six years in prison. He’s already doing time for another crime too.

“It’s been a long time coming but it’s been worth it,” Waldron said.

Waldron wrote a powerful statement that she read at the sentencing, which ends with “After today I will be able to move on. While Mr. Harrison sits in a prison with the weight of what he did, I get to finally put this in the past. I get to spend my time healing and finally being set free.”

“I just want to say to survivors out there or victims past, present and unfortunately future, there’s gonna be times where the system may mess up and make a mistake but just don’t’ give up. It’s very hard but just never give up,” she said.

Waldron is now finishing up her Associate Degree in Criminal Justice, which she said was inspired by her experience.

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