Man Convicted of Raping Woman in 2011

 Oct. 7, 2021 – A 37-year-old man was convicted Wednesday of raping a young woman in 2011 after she accepted his offer to give her a ride back to her hotel in Whitehaven, said Shelby County Dist. Atty. Gen. Amy Weirich.

    A Criminal Court jury convicted Donyel Thomas following a two-day trial this week. Thomas, who also has three other pending rape cases, will be sentenced Nov. 8 by Judge Glenn Wright.

   The incident occurred early on July 17, 2011, when the woman was walking back to her hotel after attending a party. She said Thomas pulled over in his car near Brooks Road and Millbranch Road and offered to give her a ride to her destination.

     She accepted, but instead of taking her to the hotel Thomas drove to a nearby office park at Directors Row off of Brooks where she said he threatened her with a knife and then raped her. She said he then drove off, taking her cell phone with him.

     A rape kit was prepared and a DNA sample from that kit was entered into the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) in 2015 when a match came back linking Thomas to that rape as well as to four others.

    He has been indicted in three of those cases which are pending.    

   The trial was handled by Asst. Dist. Attys. Alyssa Hennig and Dru Carpenter of the District Attorney’s Special Victims Unit that prosecutes cases of rape, child sexual abuse, severe physical abuse of child victims, elder abuse, and vulnerable adult abuse.