A maximum security interview with Kevin Coe

By Sara James, Dateline Correspondent

Being a network reporter means having the opportunity to travel to some places which are, to say the least, out of the ordinary -- such as the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla.

I made the trek there on a bright, sunny day, and as I waited in the prison yard for the interview subject to show up,  I leaned back against a 30-foot wall festooned with concertina wire.  A guard beckoned me over. "Hey, ma'am, that's a No Go Zone," he informed me.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Move away from the wall, please.  It's a shoot-to-kill zone."

I didn't waste any time following instructions.

If such precautions seem extreme, it's worth remembering that this prison is home to some notorious prisoners, and I was there to interview one of them.

When I met Kevin Coe, it was easy to see the handsome man he would have been in his 30s. He has blond hair, blue eyes, and a chiseled jaw. He seemed like the last person anyone in Spokane would have suspected as the terrifying figure from a nightmare which lasted for years.

But police say that Kevin Coe was the South Hill Rapist, a rapist who is believed to have been responsible for dozens of attacks.  A rapist whose brutality would leave his victims in terror from the day when they were thrown to the ground, a hand shoved down their throat, and raped, until now.

Indeed, one victim told us she was so traumatized, she never told her children about her attack all those years ago until she agreed to be interviewed by us. 

As we sat down there in the prison, where Kevin Coe agree to speak publicly for the first time in a decade, he insisted, again and again, on his innocence.  And yet, as those blue eyes locked onto mine, never flinching, I knew that Coe has also been labeled a psychopath,  and for a psychopath, a lie in the service of self-preservation is easy. 

What is the truth about what happened in Spokane, all those years ago?  Should Kevin Coe be freed, having served his time, or is he a danger to society?  After you watch his interview, I think you'll find you have an opinion.

Click here for the full report on "The Case of the South Hill Rapist."