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Three hours, three sex assaults

In the last of three, a mother is abducted off the street as she walks her young daughter and son to their bus stop.

By CURTIS KRUEGER
Published February 19, 2005

TAMPA - From his second-story apartment off Nebraska Avenue, Joseph LaFrance heard what he thought was an early morning fight.

Instead, it appeared two young children had just been pushed from a car.

"They've got my mother," one child screamed. "They're going to kill my mother."

A man in a small red car asking for directions had just abducted a woman as she walked her children to a bus stop. The 9-year-old boy and 8-year-old girl tried to chase the car down Lotus Avenue, still wearing their school backpacks, but it got away.

By 6 a.m. Friday, Tampa police were looking for at least two suspects in three especially brutal attacks against women that occurred during a three-hour period.

Tampa police spokesman Joe Durkin called the crimes "senseless, violent attacks that defy logic" and said, "to have three of them occur in one short time span is very unusual." He said two of the attacks may be related.

"We're really distressed. It's yet another example of violence against women," said Nikki Cruz, an advocate with the Spring of Tampa Bay domestic violence program.

One of the victims, a 48-year-old woman, was in critical condition at Tampa General Hospital after her attacker cut her with a weapon that police would not describe.

At first, LaFrance and his roommate Robert Banks didn't know exactly what had made the children so frantic Friday morning. The men immediately called police and brought the children to their apartment upstairs where LaFrance sat them on the couch and got them a blanket and hot chocolate.

Police soon arrived and LaFrance and Banks listened as the children told their story: The attacker had stopped and politely asked their mother, a 35-year-old woman, for directions. Then he pulled her into the car and eventually drove off, down Lotus Avenue.

"It was heartbreaking," said LaFrance, 54. "You should have seen them, they were darling little kids."

Later, police were able to tell the children their mother had been found. But the kids didn't know the rest of the story. The man had sexually assaulted her and dropped her off in the 1300 block of Busch Boulevard. She raced across the street to a gas station to call 911.

Police said the attacker was a black male in his 20s or 30s, about 5-foot-11 with a muscular build and short, twisted hair. The car was described as a compact red four-door with worn, red leather bucket seats and clothes piled in back.

This attack, shortly before 6 a.m., actually was the last of the three.

In the first case, about 3:15 a.m., a man driving a silver or gray Honda Civic broke into the window of a mobile home in the 4800 block of E Hillsborough Avenue.

The man sexually assaulted a 48-year-old woman and cut her so severely she required hospitalization. He was described as a 45-year-old black male, roughly 5-foot-6 inches, with a thin build and a clean-shaven face. Police say his car may have blood inside and that some sort of cloth was covering the license plate. Police don't believe that attack is related to the others.

In the second attack, about 4 a.m., someone broke into the home of a 59-year-old woman in the 4800 block of E Temple Heights Road. Police say he attempted to sexually assault her. A neighbor who looked through the window saw the man attacking her. Police gave no further information about the attack. He is described as a black male about 30 years old, about 6 feet tall and 180 pounds with very short hair. He left in an older rust-colored or maroon Toyota or Nissan with a Florida tag.

That victim was treated and released from a local hospital.

The third attack was the one where LaFrance and Banks spotted the children.

Police are asking for help solving all three cases. Anyone with information should call (813) 231-6130.

Cruz said that women who are sexually assaulted should call 911 first, but also should call the rape crisis line at (813) 264-9955.

Curtis Krueger can be reached at krueger@sptimes.com or 727 893-8232.

[Last modified February 19, 2005, 01:13:28]