RAPIST SENTENCED TO 15 YEARS.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer

LANCASTER - A swap-meet salesman who drugged and raped women he lured to his home on the pretext of a conducting a medical survey was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in state prison.

Lancaster Superior Court Judge Frank Jackson sentenced Ronald Kenneth Rowan, 48, to prison after a Department of Corrections diagnostic report said he was not a good candidate for release on probation.

``They said he was opportunistic and predatory,'' Deputy District Attorney John Portillo said.

Rowan was convicted Nov. 9 of rape and attempted rape of five victims,who were lured into his Lancaster duplex from February through September 1998 through bogus advertisements.

Beginning in 1996, investigators said, Rowen had advertised for a house-sitter, a part-time helper or someone to rent a room.

If men answered the ad, officials said Rowen discouraged them from taking the position or room.

He offered women $50 to $75 to try what he said was medication not yet on the market. The medication was actually sleeping pills.

Rowen was arrested in November 1998, after a authorities were contacted by a 25-year-old Palmdale woman. She said she participated in the ``survey'' and felt highly suspicious when she awoke. She did not remember being assaulted, but a medical exam indicated she had been raped.

Rowen had a previous conviction for a drug offense, but no other criminal record, Portillo said. He supported himself by selling Beanie Babies and other odds and ends at swap meets, Portillo said.