UPDATED Friday, March 29: ‘TriMet Barber’ facing new sex abuse allegations, records show

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A man known as the “TriMet Barber” was arrested Tuesday in Portland on suspicion of inappropriately touching a woman who was riding a MAX train, police say.

Jared Walter is accused of sex abuse, harassment and interfering with public transportation in the incident, which allegedly occurred the day before his arrest. He has been previously convicted or implicated in numerous instances of cutting, gluing or ejaculating into women’s hair on TriMet buses.

Walter, who’s known as the TriMet Barber for his slew of crimes in the Portland area dating to 2009, was arrested Tuesday afternoon at Southwest Sixth Avenue and Pine Street in Portland, according to prosecutors.

The woman reported Walter sitting behind her on the MAX train, feeling his hand in her pocket and his fingers on her thigh, according to a probable cause affidavit. She hit an emergency button after to report Walter, whom she didn’t know.

A transit police officer reported seeing Walter in train surveillance footage staring at the woman from afar before the encounter, the affidavit said. Walter moved to sit behind the woman after another passenger sitting there left. The woman jumped up from her seat soon after.

A TriMet spokeswoman said Wednesday that transit police who arrested Walter also issued him a 90-day exclusion from the Portland-area public transportation system.

He could face a longer ban, however.

A 2017 arrest of Walter sparked TriMet’s board to take unprecedented action, giving its general manager the power to ban riders for longer than six months if the person had committed “a serious physical offense” while on the system. First-time offenders could be banned for six months to one year, while second offenses could garner more than a year or a permanent ban.

“As Mr. Walter is currently in jail, and an exclusion is in place if he is released, we will take the time to investigate and to be deliberate as we determine next steps,” Roberta Altstadt, TriMet spokeswoman, said in a statement Wednesday. “Once we have additional information, we will evaluate whether the alleged conduct may qualify for a longer exclusion.”

Walter was being held in the Multnomah County Detention Center on $9,000 bail and was set to be arraigned at 2 p.m. Wednesday.

Each of the crimes he’s accused of are misdemeanors.

Investigators think there may be additional victims, according to Portland police. Police urged anyone who may have witnessed or been a victim of similar conduct to call 503-962-7566.

-- Jim Ryan; jryan@oregonian.com; 503-221-8005; @Jimryan015

Andrew Theen of The Oregonian/OregonLive staff contributed to this report

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