Pa. man found guilty of raping woman in Ohio

AKRON (AP) — A man accused of attacking a woman in the parking lot of a Pittsburgh-area shopping mall before driving her to Ohio and raping her was convicted Friday of 14 of the 15 felony charges against him.

Police said Jimmy Lee Tayse, 30, attacked the woman April 7 outside a Giant Eagle grocery store. He was armed with a knife when he climbed into the back seat of the car owned by the 33-year-old woman, forcing her to drive with her 16-month-old daughter to Akron.

Authorities said he raped the woman at an Akron hotel, then dropped her and the baby in Cleveland, where Tayse was arrested after a motorist recognized the car’s license plate number from a news report.

Tayse, of Johnstown, Pa., was found guilty in Summit County Common Pleas Court of charges including kidnapping, felonious assault, rape, aggravated robbery and grand theft. He was found innocent of one of the felonious assault charges against him.

Summit County Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh and Chief Counsel Mary Ann Kovach tried Tayse after the Allegheny County, Pa., district attorney requested that Summit County handle the case.

Ohio law permits prosecution of cases where criminal activity originates outside the state but continues into Ohio.