There is a degree of alarm with regard to the upcoming release of a serial rapist/child molester, particularly in Chino, where he is currently imprisoned.
David Allen Funston, now 64, was actively involved in luring, kidnapping and assaulting girls in the Sacramento area, some as young as four and five years old, in the 1990s.
Funston’s crimes intensified in terms of frequency and seriousness in a two-year period beginning in 1995. According to prosecutors and testimony and evidence presented at his trial, he would children playing outside their homes in the Sacramento suburbs, utilizing candy and toys to get his victims into his vehicle.
Funston, then-33, moved to the Sacramento area suburb of North Highlands after his conviction for sexually assaulting a woman in Colorado. He obtained a job as a marketing associate at a wholesale foods company, and at some point concentrated his assaults on children rather than adults. It is believed he did so because he believed this would reduce the probability of being caught.
With some of his victims, Funston engaged in repeated and excruciating sex acts.
In one case, according to the woman who prosecuted him, he beat a seven year-old girl and when she began to scream and cry, he stuffed her underwear down her throat. He continued to rape her after doing so.
That case was prosecuted by then Sacramento County Deputy District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert. According to Schubert, after the rape, he abandoned the girl on the side of Highway 50.
In another case in 1995, Funston used candy to induce a five-year-old girl to get into his car in Highland Hills. He drove her into the hills and assaulted her there.
Most of Funston’s victims were girls. One known victim was a five-year-old boy. In November 1995, Funston took that child into some bushes and undergrowth, and orally copulated him. pulled down his pants, and orally copulated him,
Funston’s crime spree would come to a close less than a week later. Four days after his assault of the boy, he kidnapped two girls, aged four and five, sisters who were near their grandmother’s apartment by offering them candy and a ride. A neighbor saw the girls getting in his car and called the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office.
Funston apparently lost his nerve and let the girls out of his car a few blocks away. A sheriff’s department follow-up located Funston and he was arrested. He has been in captivity ever since.
Upon his conviction, he was sentenced to 20 years and 8 months in prison and three consecutive sentences of 25 years to life, which prosecutors said would ensure that he would never be released. Now 64 and incarcerated at the California Institution for Men in Chino, he became eligible for a parole suitability hearing in 2022, based upon his having reached the age of 50 and being behind bars for twenty continuous years. He was denied parole in May 2022 but upon reconsideration last September, he is to be released. That decision was reviewed and upheld A date for his departure has not been set
Schubert is now in her second term as Sacramento County District Attorney. She is among those calling for a reexamination of the decision to release Funston.
When an inmate is released from custody by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, he typically is returned to his former home by means of pre-arranged travel provided by family or friends or is provided bus or train tickets to the county of conviction. Funston does not have a home in Sacramento County, so it is unknown whether he will make an effort to return to Sacramento County.
Released prisoners are often given “gate money” of approximately $200 and taken to the nearest transit center upon release.
There is no legal mandate that Funston leave Chino upon his release from the Chino Institution for Men.