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Recent attacks on women, girl linked
By TAMARA LUSH, Times Staff Writer
TAMPA -- A serial rapist lurks on Fowler Avenue, somewhere near the Denny's and the Bank of America. He is near the Kwik Stop on 131st Avenue. At a vacant apartment on N 17th Street. Dangerously close to the University Mall. Since Feb. 21, authorities say, he has raped four women and tried to attack two others in the neighborhood just west of the mall. All the victims have been black women between the ages of 15 and 22. Hillsborough sheriff's detectives say three of the assaults happened at night, three during the day. None of the victims knew her attacker, which sets the cases apart from the sexual batteries usually reported to authorities. "Stranger rape is fairly rare," said Sgt. Robert Spooner of the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office, who is in charge of the investigation. In 2002, there were 494 rapes in Hillsborough County, including the city of Tampa. It is not known how many of those were so-called "stranger rapes,"' but Spooner says he usually investigates only one or two such cases a year. Spooner lists six attacks he thinks are linked to one man: Feb. 21: A woman was walking into her apartment at 1:45 p.m. when she was raped at gunpoint. March 4: At 6:27 a.m., a woman who was walking down the street was forced into a vacant apartment on N 17th Street and raped. March 20: A woman was walking on 19th Street north of 131st Street when a man approached her. The woman kept walking and yelled for help. The man fled. "She had a bit of a survival instinct," Spooner said. April 8: A woman walking on the 1700 block of E Fowler Avenue was forced into the bushes at gunpoint and raped. April 10: A woman was raped at 4:10 p.m in the same neighborhood. April 11: A 15-year-old girl walking to her school bus stop said someone who looked like the sketches of the rapist grabbed her. She turned and ran away. Sheriff's detectives have gone door-to-door in apartment complexes in recent weeks, passing out fliers with a composite sketch of the rapist. The man is described as a black male 18 to 20 years old, 5 feet 9 to 5 feet 10, 150 to 180 pounds, with black hair. Although the University of South Florida is nearby, none of the victims was a student, Spooner said. Marsha Leyva, a 24-year-old USF student, hadn't heard about the attacks. Earlier this week, she was getting a mid morning coffee at the Dunkin' Donuts on Fowler Avenue, across the street from where one of the rapes occurred. "I guess this is just a reminder that you've got to be careful if you are a woman," she said. Kanesha Johnson, 25, lives in an apartment on 122nd Avenue. Sheriff's officers came to her door with a sketch of the man. Since then, she doesn't walk home at night from her swing shift job. A co-worker drives her home. But because she doesn't have a car, Johnson still has to walk during the day. She stopped to talk to a reporter on her walk home. As she spoke about feeling wary of every man she sees on the street, a young man walked by. He strolled into a vacant grassy lot surrounded by trees. "I'm terrified," Johnson said and walked quickly home. -- Tamara Lush can be reached at 226-3373 or lush@sptimes.com.
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