(Photo courtesy of the FBI)

The D.C. U.S. Attorney’s Office has indicted a serial D.C.-area rapist based on DNA samples collected at several crime scenes in the mid-2000s.

This man, known only as the D.C.-Area Hotel Rapist, is believed to have raped between six and nine women in the metro area between August 22, 1998 and February 6, 2006, according to a press release from the USAO. In most of these cases, the assailant snuck into hotel rooms and victimized housekeepers entering to clean.

He used a box cutter, a neck tie, or a cord to threaten his victims—in one 2002 case at a hotel in Silver Spring, he left behind a red box cutter with the word ‘Debbie’ scrawled in black on the inside. In another case at the Renaissance Hotel in Mount Vernon in 2003, his 27-year-old victim managed to pull the ring off his finger. The FBI is planning to start a social media campaign featuring photos of the box cutter, the ring, and a composite sketch of the assailant based on his DNA profile, according to The Washington Post.

“The suspect is someone who knows the routine in hotels and is familiar with how they operate,” Special Agent Erin Sheridan of the FBI’s Washington Field Office said in an FBI news release. “The attacks often occurred during the day, when there were not many guests and the cleaning staff were going in and out of the rooms.”

The District has a 15-year statute of limitations on sexual assault cases. May 11 of this year would have marked the end of the statute for the assailant’s first crime in D.C., in which he assaulted the housekeeper at the Renaissance Hotel. May 23 marked the 15-year-anniversary of his second crime in the city, in which he assaulted a 68-year-old housekeeper at the Jefferson Hotel on 16th Street NW. (The man’s various other crimes occured in Virginia and Maryland, which have no statute of limitations for sexual assault crimes).

To head off the statute of limitations, the USAO in D.C. indicted the man based on his DNA profile on May 1 of this year, despite still not knowing his name. This is the first time the D.C. USAO has indicted someone this way, according to the press release. The technique has been used in other jurisdictions.

The FBI and MPD are asking for the public’s help in identifying the man at the center of these crimes. They’re offering a combined reward of $45,000 to anyone who has information that leads to the arrest of the suspect. The man was suspected to be in his 20s or 30s at the time of the crimes, so in his late 30s or 40s now. He’s described as an African-American man between 5’7” and 5’10”, of medium to stocky build. His composite sketch was created not from eyewitness accounts, but from his DNA, which provides information on eye color, skin color, “face morphology, and detailed biographical ancestry with age progression,” according to the USAO.

“Working with the public and our law enforcement partners, we are hopeful that we finally will be able to hold this serial rapist accountable for his brazen crimes,” said Jessie K. Liu, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, in the press release. “DNA evidence has enabled us to push this case forward and we are hopeful that this DNA profile, and the community, can help us finally achieve justice. Despite the passage of time, we have never forgotten these victims.”

You can see more photos of the evidence in the case, including the box cutter, the ring and a dropped hat, on the FBI’s website. You can also see a detailed map of the incidents, including a timeline and information on which are DNA-linked.