While some women would try to clear their mind of a brutal sexual attack, for four decades, one woman who was raped in Montgomery County, Maryland, while in college, wouldn’t let herself forget it.
“I was raped and sexually assaulted 43 years ago,” said one of two women who were in Rockville courtroom Thursday, as a North Carolina man, Marion Pearson, was sentenced to 17 years in prison for two sexual assaults in April and June of 1981.
Speaking exclusively to WTOP, the woman — who we’ll call Jane to protect her privacy as a sexual assault victim — says she was 21, a student at University of Maryland, and was working part-time providing services for people with disabilities when she was raped while walking on University Boulevard.
“I heard his footsteps,” Jane recalled. “We went down an embankment, and he bound and blindfolded me, assaulted me, and raped me, in a very small, little patch of woods.”
Almost two months later, in June, a second woman was attacked and sexually assaulted in the area of Connecticut Avenue near Denfield Road.
“These were stranger on stranger attacks,” said Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy. “Both were out, walking around Montgomery County in the early ’80s, dragged into wooded areas, and sexually assaulted.”
Despite the similarities, the cases went unsolved. “At the time I was told by one of the detectives that there were fibers collected and two hair specimens,” said Jane.
It wasn’t until 1986 that DNA was first introduced as evidence in the United States criminal court system, according to the Department of Justice.
“In 1981, there were no DNA databases,” said McCarthy. “We hadn’t advanced to the point where we could connect offenders with DNA.”
He could reappear at any time
For four decades, Jane remained hopeful that her attacker would eventually be identified.
“I lived all these years in fear,” she told WTOP. “He had robbed me, so he knew my address, he knew my name, and I felt like he could reappear at any time.”
Despite the fear and uncertainty, “I actually tried very hard to remember his voice, in the event that I would ever need to identify him,” she said.
In 2018, when the man who had previously been identified as “The Potomac River Rapist” was identified through DNA, Jane said she “was kind of almost hopeful” that police would determine that he was also the man who had attacked her, although police and the FBI later ruled that out.
The so-called “Potomac River Rapist” suspect, Giles Warrick, killed himself in a D.C. jail cell while awaiting trial in 2022.
However, Jane said her discussions with Montgomery County cold case detectives led to submitting evidence for modern DNA analysis, which pointed toward Marion Pearson. He had served 22 years in a North Carolina prison for a series of first-degree rapes and was released in 2020.
This past October, Pearson pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree rape and one count of second-degree sex assault for the attacks. During that hearing, it was announced that the plea agreement called for Pearson to serve 17 years in prison.
During Thursday’s sentencing, Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge Rachel McGuckian sentenced Pearson to 40 years in prison, suspending all but 17 years to serve and two years of supervised probation, upon release. He will also be required to register as a sex offender for life.
Before sentencing, Jane called her victim impact statement a “very raw, very graphic description of what he did and what I experienced.”
Pearson apologized Thursday in court.
“He looked at both of us, and he was tearful, and I think he was quite sincere in his apology,” said Jane. “I do very much give him credit for that, however, that doesn’t change the last 43 years.”
While Pearson said he was sorry, Jane pointed to earlier appeals during his North Carolina conviction and sentence, “that he didn’t fully take responsibility for what he did to any of his victims, and really focused on the violation of his rights, which I think is a sign of faulty thinking, and perhaps some type of pathology.”
Despite being told that recidivism rates for offenders of Pearson’s age “are pretty low,” said she is glad he will be in prison.
“I just think he needs to be protected from his own faulty thinking and impulsive behavior,” Jane said, “and that society at large, including myself, need to be protected from him.”
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