Ronald L. Fischer, 70, one of Rhode Island’s Most Wanted fugitives for more than two decades, was captured Thursday by the U.S. Coast Guard and Deputy U.S. Marshals aboard his 56-foot sailing vessel.
Fischer was arrested in the ocean an hour off the New York and New Jersey coastline. It is the end of a run from justice that began when he walked out of his own rape trial in 2005 and simply never came back.
In 2003, then-doctor Fischer raped a woman aboard his boat named “Lion King” while moored in Newport, Rhode Island. When his criminal trial began in 2005, he disappeared. A jury convicted him in absentia of first-degree sexual assault. He has been wanted on charges of first-degree sexual assault, failure to appear, and flight to avoid prosecution ever since.
For twenty years, he lived under the alias Richard Graydon, registering “The Silver Lining” under that name and sailing up and down the American coast.
Finally, this week the Rhode Island Violent Fugitive Task Force, working alongside FBI Special Agents, FBI intelligence analysts, and Rhode Island State Police, followed leads that placed Fischer just outside New York.
A 45-foot Coast Guard Response Boat intercepted “The Silver Lining” offshore, where Fischer was taken into custody without incident. He was being held in Manhattan Thursday evening.
“This arrest demonstrates that time does not erase accountability,” U.S. Marshal Wing Chau of the District of Rhode Island said after the arrest. “For more than twenty years, Ronald Fischer believed he had successfully escaped justice. The men and women of the Rhode Island Violent Fugitive Task Force, together with our partners, remained committed to ensuring that day would eventually come.”
“Thanks to outstanding investigative work, exceptional intelligence analysis, and seamless coordination between agencies, Fischer is finally in custody. We hope today’s arrest brings a measure of justice and long-awaited closure to the victim and everyone impacted by these crimes.”