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Boy faces adult charges in attack
By CARY DAVIS, Times Staff Writer Prosecutors have filed the first of what they expect will be multiple adult felony charges against a 16-year-old boy accused of breaking into four Hudson homes this month and beating up three young girls as they slept. Prosecutors on Wednesday charged James Anthony Jacobs of 12908 Willoughby Drive in Hudson with burglary/battery, a first-degee felony that carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. Assistant State Attorney Mike Halkitis said Thursday that he was in the process of filing a second burglary/battery charge against Jacobs. Halkitis said he expects to file additional charges once his office completes its investigation of all four incidents. Explaining the decision to prosecute Jacobs as an adult instead of a juvenile, Halkitis said, "You don't get very many cases as serious as this." Jacobs was arrested earlier this month along with his best friend, Jonathan Ainsworth, after a string of break-ins and brutal beatings that traumatized a community and left one victim, a 10-year-old girl, hospitalized with a broken skull. Halkitis said his office still is deciding whether to charge Ainsworth, 16, as an adult. The brazen attacks occurred in the space of four days in early January. In each case, the Pasco County Sheriff's Office said, the victims and attackers knew each other. The girls ranged in age from 10 to 14. Authorities say Jacobs acted alone in at least two of the four attacks. He broke into the girls' houses in the middle of the night and, as their families slept, attacked the victims, the Sheriff's Office has said. He covered the girls' mouths and punched their faces, according to reports. One victim, a 14-year-old girl, lived a few houses from Jacobs. According to reports, Jacobs broke into the girl's house, put a knife to her throat and said, "Shut up or I'll kill you." The girl recognized her attacker's voice and was instrumental in leading detectives to Jacobs, the Sheriff's Office said. Jacobs was charged Wednesday in connection with the attack on the 14-year-old girl. Ainsworth accompanied Jacobs on at least one attack, the Sheriff's Office said. That case involved a 13-year-old girl who, several months earlier, had turned Ainsworth down when he asked her out on a date. The girl identified Ainsworth as the boy who beat her, officials say. It's not clear if the girl's refusal to date Ainsworth served as motivation for the attack. The motives for the other three attacks also remain unclear. The victims, whose names are being withheld by the Times, were not touched sexually and nothing was stolen from their homes, officials say. Jacobs and Ainsworth are both students at Hudson High School. Since their arrests, they have been held at the Pasco County Juvenile Detention Center.
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