Witness: Attacker drowned woman

Youngstown has had 32 killings so far this year; 2004 saw 22 homicides.
By SEAN BARRON
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- The city's latest homicide victim was drowned.
The nude body of an East Side woman was found shortly before 4 a.m. Sunday floating in a creek in a wooded area near Erie Street and Earle Avenue.
Tahnee Jackson, 29, of Cassius Street was killed when a man held her head under water after forcing her at gunpoint to undress and get into the water, according to a witness' statement to police. The creek's name wasn't in the police report of the killing.
The witness told police she and Jackson were approached around 1:20 a.m. outside a bar on North Garland Avenue, on the city's East Side, by two men saying they needed a ride. The four then went to Friedas on West Rayen Avenue and stayed until closing, a police report shows.
Points a gun
They left, and a short time later, one of the men pointed a small handgun at Jackson and ordered her to stop the car. The men robbed the other victim of her jewelry, and one of the men ordered the women to get into the trunk. After realizing they wouldn't fit in the trunk, the perpetrators told the victims to get into the back seat, police said.
The men drove back to the Garland Avenue bar, but when another vehicle pulled up next to them, Jackson grabbed the gun, tossed it out the window and tried to escape. The gunman, however, pulled her back into the vehicle and sped off, according to the statement.
The men drove to a park near Delason Avenue and again ordered the two out of the vehicle, the report shows. One of the men used a rock to smash a window after Jackson got back in and locked the doors, the report continues.
The man tore Jackson's clothes off her and struck her with tree "sticks and branches until she fell to her knees," the second victim told police. After forcing Jackson to remove an undergarment, the man made her walk down an embankment to the creek, where he went in after Jackson and held her head under until she stopped moving, the witness recounted.
Description
Police briefly chased the gunman before being flagged down by the other victim, whom they described as "hysterical." The killer was described as a dark-skinned black man, around 35 years old, with scraggly facial hair, a red skull cap and a dark shirt or jacket. No description of the second man was in the report.
Jackson is the city's 32nd homicide victim this year. Youngstown had recorded 16 killings at this time last year, with 22 homicides in all of 2004.